Pawn To Queen
by Riley
Summary: A somewhat Nietzschean twist on Snape/Hermione. The Potions Master and his best student find themselves entering into a partnership that neither of them could have expected, courtesy of Lucius Malfoy. NOTE: chapter 3 updated again: Hermione's now 18.
1. Prologue: Setting Up the Board

Disclaimer: J.K. Rowling owns everyone and everything in this. I make no money from it nor intend to.   
  


This thing started as a gestalt of the Nietzschean student-teacher relationship(s) in C.J. Cherryh's masterpiece _Cyteen_ and the "pawn-to-queen" metaphor in Laurie R. King's _The Beekeeper's Apprentice._ The ultimate result is probably not something either author would want to take credit for--- too kinky for LRK, too simplistic for CJC. Also, my notion of Snape's childhood evolved on its own... then I went back and realized that it strongly, strongly resembled the early experiences of Stephen Ridenour in Jane Fancher's Groundties novels (which I love and adore). Anyway, go, read the novels, buy the novels, make the authors who inspired this thing happy. GRIN   
  


Also, some fanfic authors deserve credit for their contributions: R.J. Anderson came up with the Exaudio charm (which I initially mistook for Rowlings' own creation!), Dumbledore's "nightly inspection of his eyelids", and Snape's pulling of an Invisibility Cloak over a partner's head in a gesture of farewell. J.L. Matthews and I were thinking along the same lines at one point--- which I have annotated after the relevant chapter to avoid a spoiler. Sphinx's brilliant fics inspired me as well--- again, annotated following the relevant chapters. Erica H. Smith's "Postscript" to R.J. Anderson's fics showed me how Blaise and Hermione became friends.   
  


I have this problem with remembering titles and authors, of _anything_--- I can discuss and quote from any number of books... but who wrote them? The title? Oh, help! Which is exactly what I'm asking everyone to do. If you recognize something from somewhere else, please, please let me know. Even if I haven't read the piece, I will happily mention anyone else who's doing something similar. We're all in this together.   
  


Also, many thanks and BIG HUGS to my wonderful betas: vanguard, Vic, and Danielle.   
  


Pawn to Queen   
  


Prologue: Setting Up the Board    
  
  
  


"Neville, all you have to do is add a drop, just a drop---" Hermione Granger demonstrated, tapping her vial of dragon's blood delicately over her caldron. She looked over at Neville Longbottom, who was trembling at the cauldron next to her; though the pewter bowls were billowing steam up at their owners, she was quite certain that most of the drops of moisture on Neville's round flushed face were not from the heat of the cauldrons. 

"Like--- this?" he asked timidly, trying to imitate her movement--- but his hand shook so badly that he dumped half the vial in. 

"Oh, no!" Hermione exclaimed. Dragon's blood was a very potent substance, and if she remembered correctly, that much of an excess in a Febrifugius Potion would--- 

Thinking fast, she reached over and dumped most of her own stores of dried fairy wing into Neville's vat. It would render the potion absolutely useless, of course--- but fairy wings in this mixture would counteract the explosive tendencies of dragon's blood, and _she_ rather thought a failed potion was better than an explosion. 

Professor Snape, who had materialized at their side with his usual wretchedly perfect sense of timing, clearly did _not_ share her opinion. "What's this?" he snapped at her. "Showing off again, Miss Granger? Letting your housemates ride your academic coattails?" 

Hermione opened her mouth to say something, then realized she was stuck. If she explained what had happened, Neville would be in trouble--- and _his_ grades couldn't afford whatever Snape would do to him. To say nothing of the fact that he was scared witless of Snape. 

Well, she wasn't. She snapped her mouth closed and met his gaze with what she hoped was the correct mixture of deference and defiance. 

Snape stared back at her coldly for a moment. "Well, then, Miss Granger," he said icily, "let's see how much _help_ you've been to your hapless housemate, shall we?" He snatched up her ladle from the table and measured a small quantity of the potion into a vial. 

Hermione's stomach sank through the floor. The potion, of course, wasn't going to work--- in fact, if she remembered--- 

"Here." Her unpleasant ruminations were disrupted by the even more unpleasant experience of having Snape thrust the rather strong-smelling vial under her nose. "Drink this, Miss Granger--- at this dose, the potion will only lower your temperature a few tenths of a degree, not enough to be significant--- _if_, that is," he added sarcastically, "it works at all." The entire class was watching now, the Gryffindors with sympathy--- for her--- and rage--- at Snape... the Slytherins gloating disgustingly. She thought she saw Pansy Parkinson giggle, the pug-faced nitwit. 

Hermione regarded the vial with dread. Fairy wings in the Febrifugius Potion, coupled with the dragon's blood... had turned it into a _very_ powerful emetic. She knew it. And, judging from the rather ghastly look of anticipation on Snape's face, _he_ knew it. 

Beside her, Neville raised his hand timidly. "Sir, it's m-my p-p-p-potion," he stammered. "Hadn't I ought to---" 

"It _was_ your potion, Mr. Longbottom," Snape snapped. "But since Miss Granger, here---" he swept a cold glance over at her, and she cringed inwardly--- "has seen fit to take on the task of doing your work for you, it is only fair that she should enjoy her own handiwork." He raised an eyebrow. "Isn't that so, Miss Granger?" 

Well, there was only one thing to do, unless she wanted to spend the rest of the afternoon--- and probably the whole weekend, given that dosage--- with Madam Pomfrey. "Sir," she gulped, "it--- it won't work---" 

"Really?" His trademark sneer was going full blast. "And why is that, Miss Granger?" 

He knows, she thought, and he's going to make me say it anyway. "B-because---" stupid stammer!--- "I put fairy wings into it." 

Snape's eyebrows flew up into his lank, oily hair. "Sabotaging another student's work, Miss Granger? And another Gryffindor, at that?" He leaned close, his hands resting on the table between them. "So, it's not enough glory for you to get the best grades in the school, is it? You have to make absolutely certain that everyone else fails, too?" 

_If that were true, the Sorting Hat would have put me in Slytherin, and then you'd be gloating about my cunning, like you do Malfoy's,_ Hermione thought, but had more sense than to say. 

Neville opened his mouth to explain, but Hermione stepped on his foot behind the cauldron. There was no need to get both of them in trouble. 

Abruptly, Snape leaned back, dumping the vial's contents into the cauldron. "Very well," he said. "Ten points from Gryffindor apiece--- and, I think, a detention for Miss Granger." 

Hermione couldn't suppress a look of horror. She'd _never_ had a detention from a teacher before! She was a prefect! And it was just like Snape to break her perfect record. 

Snape started to sweep off, then looked back at them. "And you, Mr. Longbottom, will produce a working AntiPyrate by the end of class---" the period was half over--- _"by yourself_, or it's another ten points from Gryffindor." And, finally, he left them. 

Hermione and Neville shot each other sympathetic glances. "Hermione," he asked plaintively, "why didn't you let me explain?" 

"Because it wasn't worth both of us getting in more trouble," she said. "You wouldn't want to be stuck down here with him for two hours tonight, would you?" 

Neville shuddered and turned back to his cauldron, looking totally bewildered at the prospect of making a potion without her help.   
  


*****   
  
  
  


"Miss Granger." Snape's soft voice cracked like a whip across her skin. "Before you slink off with your... _friends_---" his voice turned the word into something slimy, his eyes moving from her to Harry and Ron--- "there's a little matter of your detention." 

"Go on," Hermione said sotto voce to the boys. "I'll be okay." This last to Ron, who was regarding her with some concern. 

"Sure," Harry said affably, though she noticed his eyes flickered to Snape. "C'mon, Ron---" He took their friend's arm with rather more firmness than camaraderie required. "See you in the common room, Hermione." 

As the boys disappeared through the door, Hermione turned back to Snape, trying _not_ to think of some of the things he'd made her friends do over the years. Cleaning the bedpans in the hospital wing without magic probably took first place for horrible. 

She approached his desk, and stood before him silently, not wanting to make things worse. 

For a moment, Snape sat still in his chair, his fingers steepled and his eyes elsewhere, a very sour expression on his face--- almost as if he were warring with himself. 

Abruptly, he sat forward, his eyes coming to focus on her with the intensity of a stooping hawk. She fought the urge to jump back, stood her ground. "I have an experiment to conduct tonight," he said abruptly. "One which, unfortunately, requires two pairs of hands and eyes--- and two brains possessed of at least moderate intelligence and knowledge of the properties of magical ingredients." His eyes narrowed unpleasantly. "Since you seem so familiar with the more--- complex--- aspects of potions making, it seems only appropriate that your punishment be to assist me." 

For a moment, Hermione could only stare at him, while bits and pieces of a puzzle sorted themselves out in her mind. He _had _recognized what she'd done for Neville... and his choice of punishment for her had been entirely self-serving. 

Her mouth started working before her common sense could take over. "Of course, sir," she said coolly, "but the next time you need an assistant, I don't suppose you could enlist my services without taking points from Gryffindor?" 

The minute the words were out of her mouth, she wanted to bite her tongue in two. She snapped her lips together and regarded him fearfully. 

But--- for a moment--- it appeared as if her fears were groundless. Snape regarded her in mild astonishment... and for a second, the unpleasant glitter in his eyes warmed to something almost like amusement. 

Then, before she had time to relax, that cold cruel glint was back. "I suppose I _could_, Miss Granger," he said dryly, "if you and your _friends_ did not make it necessary for me to penalize you." He sank back in his chair. "I'll expect you here tonight at six." One long bony hand flickered in the air. "Now--- out!" 

She _out_ed.   
  


*****   
  
  
  


The door closed behind the Granger girl, but Severus Snape stared after her for a moment, a wry smile playing about his lips. 

A smile that turned quickly to a self-disgusted sneer; it galled him to have to praise Draco Malfoy's mediocre efforts, to show favor to the spawn of a man he despised--- for Lucius Malfoy fell right behind the late James Potter and his little gang in Snape's lexicon of loathing--- while a bright little star like Miss Granger went begging. It took extra effort not to show her favor; he had to go out of his way to be hard on her, lest he slip in an unguarded moment, and show his approval for such an intellect. Only through subterfuges such as this one could he show her any favor. Transparent device, really; there were Sixth Form students in Ravenclaw who'd be as useful. 

No, he corrected himself, not as useful as she. Yes, there were bright little Ravenclaws aplenty, even a Slytherin or two with a sharp mind--- but Hermione was that one-in-a-thousand intellect that every teacher dreamed of having, just once. And not just brilliant, either--- he'd wager that his young cousin Blaise Zabini, had an intellect to rival Miss Granger's... but not the drive, not the hunger. Not the... _ambition._

"What a waste," he muttered to himself. One wizarding parent--- just one; half-bloods were acceptable to the Sorting Hat, as one Tom Riddle had proved to the despair of his House--- and she could have been a Slytherin. 

One of _his_. Her sharp mind and drive to learn a credit to _his _House, and not Minerva McGonagall's. 

Gods knew Slytherin could use the help, he thought dryly, sitting forward to regard the essays on his desk with some distaste. He remembered the days before Voldemort, when Slytherin had won the House Cup fairly, by dint of drive and cleverness... and success. 

Like _him,_ in his student days. He remembered, with a vivid pang, the evenings in the Serpents' Den, the little group of them--- Evan Rosier, who never talked about anything but money, Ellen Wilkes (he still couldn't think her name without shuddering) Bethany Kendrick and Anton Lestrange, who were inseparable, Jeremiah Avery (of whom the less said the better, in Snape's opinion)... and him. The youngest of the lot by a full two years, but _belonging_. His knowledge of the Dark Arts--- indeed, the speed with which he learned just about anything--- had bought him acceptance into their little group. 

Of its own accord, his hand moved to cover the Dark Mark on his other arm. Better to have stayed an outcast! 

A sneer twisted his mouth. Better for Miss Granger, too--- she'd have been better off on her own than hanging about with Harry Potter... James' son. James the thoughtless, the adored, James whose foolhardiness and arrogance had destroyed his own friends.... 

Best not to think about that. But it was uncanny how this Gryffindor Muggle-born could so closely resemble him--- even to covering a friend's mistakes. 

Of course, she did it out of the goodness of her heart, no doubt. _He'd_ always done it for pride's sake.... But at least it was an honest pride, Slytherin pride in being the best. 

_That _was no longer the case in his House, when any student of character who knew anything about the Houses--- and the ones with any wizarding blood, the only ones Slytherin would accept, all did--- would do anything to avoid being Sorted into Slytherin. The only students who wanted to enter his house were.... 

His lip curled. _Inbred_ was the best word for it. Inbred, like Malfoy and his goons, marrying into the same lines for centuries. Inbred, trading on family name and family money, and cruelty, rather than ability. The dregs of a once-noble House, the worst possible result of an attempt at eugenics. 

This time the twist to his lip was self-mocking. He was pureblood as any of his charges--- but both the Snape and Andropolous sides of his family had believed in separating out the culls from their bloodlines. An Andropolous woman wouldn't deign to carry an inferior child to term. 

Snape ran his hand through his greasy hair--- no matter how often he washed it, the oil seeped back into his hair within a few hours--- and sighed ruefully. Sometimes he wondered how _he'd _been allowed to be born. 

But then Lucretia Andropolous Snape, Potions Mistress at Durmstrang Institute, would have been proud to know that her son had been a Death Eater.... 

A Death Eater. The blackest of the black, their evil outmatched only by their pettiness.... 

He banished that thought coldly. At least he had something like a worthwhile purpose now. And at the moment... he had his students' appalling work to grade, and the experiment to prepare for. 

The experiment.... He felt his lips draw to a thin line. Miss Granger would no doubt be pleased to learn that her efforts tonight were going toward the development of a cure for lycanthropy. Dumbledore had tasked him with it--- the Headmaster's subtle way of punishing him for unmasking Remus Lupin. 

Well, at least it was a task worthy of his skill. And perhaps, Miss Granger would be worthy of it herself.   
  


*****   
  
  
  


Hermione could hardly believe her ears. "A what?" 

Snape raised an eyebrow at her. "I was under the impression, Miss Granger, that your hearing was in excellent condition--- certainly, you seem quite capable of exchanging whispered confidences with your Gryffindor cohorts... on my class time, might I add." 

"My... my hearing's fine, sir." _It's my credulity that's a little strained._ Why Snape would want to develop a potion that would, among other things, assist someone he despised... well, it was about as out of character for him.... 

As complimenting her. Which he'd done earlier, in a backhanded sort of way. 

As if he could read her mind, his lips twitched. "Professor Dumbledore requested it," he said shortly, "and therefore, I should like to accomplish the task with all due haste." He shot her a sarcastic look. "_If,_ that is, you've finished gaping like a codfish and are ready to proceed." 

Hermione snapped her mouth shut. "Yes, sir." 

You couldn't say it wasn't a fascinating detention, she thought, several hours later--- she'd rather lost track of time. In between grilling her ruthlessly on the properties of various magical ingredients, Snape had set her to performing a series of tests on different compounds under his watchful eye, and taking notes while he performed some of the more delicate experiments. She'd learned more about potions making in one evening than in a year of classes. 

Mostly, she thought, keeping her face expressionless as she carefully measured wolfsbane into a solution of dragon's blood and moonflower, because Snape wasn't biting her head off the entire time. Apart from a few sharp remarks which seemed more out of habit than malice, he'd been... well, _pleasant _wasn't exactly a word you'd ever use about Professor Snape... but _interesting_. He'd been completely absorbed in his work, seeming almost to forget that she was there--- or that he was, that either of them were anything more than an extension of the lab equipment.... 

She sneaked a glance up at him: his dark eyes locked on the beaker, watching as the flecks of wolfsbane landed pinch by pinch in the compound, his long, thin fingers twitching slightly, one hand almost caressing the quill poised over the parchment on the table. The glint in his eyes was--- for once--- entirely devoid of anything like malice. 

Realization hit her, almost making her hand shake on the vial she held. _This is what he loves,_ she realized. _This is what he'd do all the time if he could--- just research and study and experiment. _The thought made her feel warm toward him--- the researcher's life had always appealed to her too. 

Perhaps he heard her thoughts--- Harry occasionally swore that Snape could read minds, though she always thought that if that were the case, Gryffindor House would never get out of detention--- or at least felt her eyes on him, for he looked up, the cruel glitter back in his eyes. "Miss Granger, what is so interesting that you would take your eyes off your task, may I ask?" 

"Sorry, sir," she said hastily, returning her eyes to the beaker before he could ask again. 

He snorted. "Well, you've been here long enough--- there's only half an hour till curfew." 

Now she did jump, and it was only quick reflexes that prevented her from spilling the whole vial of wolfsbane into the beaker. "Yes, you've certainly been here long enough--- any longer, and you'll ruin this evening's work with your clumsiness," he said sharply, getting to his feet and sweeping off toward his desk. "Clean up, and you're free to leave." 

He settled behind his desk--- to grade papers, she presumed; she gathered the used beakers and other implements for washing in the basin, then started to put the ingredients back on their shelves, careful to return them to the places they'd been when she'd arrived. 

"Well done," said a silky voice that she only barely recognized as Snape's. She'd never heard him use that silk except as a threat. Which this was anything but. 

She nearly dropped the bottle of moonflower extract she'd been holding, turned to look at him. 

He was sitting at his desk--- but _not_ grading papers. His hands were steepled in front of him and he was regarding her moodily. "Most of your _peers_---" he said the word like an insult--- "would have shoved everything back on the shelves in as much haste and as little order as they could manage. You, on the other hand, take the time to _organize_." 

The approval in his voice made her more nervous than his sarcasm ever had; she set the moonflower extract in its place with a shaking hand. "Thank you, sir." 

It was a rather awkward moment; in the end, the only thing she could think of to do was to return to her task. 

The last of the bottles was on its shelf before he spoke again. "Tell me something, Miss Granger," he said, volumes of irony this time in that silky voice; she turned to look at him, fighting a startled quiver. "Why couldn't you have had the decency to have at least _one_ wizarding parent?" As she regarded him in shock, his lips twitched. "Even a grandparent might have been enough, in your case, for that blasted Sorting Hat to put you in Slytherin." 

The floor suddenly wanted to wander out from under her feet; she leaned on the table nearest her. "Sir?" 

"Slytherin could use a mind like yours," he said dryly, "instead of---" he broke off abruptly, his lips twitching, and she dared a comment. 

"Crabbe and Goyle?" 

His eyes darkened and for a second she feared she'd gone too far. Then his expression cleared and he snorted; it was _almost_ a laugh. "Yes, those two goons... do you know, they always remind me that inbreeding is only effective when you cull for reinforced harmful recessives?" 

The comment was so quintessentially _Snape_ in its sarcasm--- and yet so unlike him for its frankness--- that it startled a laugh out of her. She met his eyes, and found that his thin lips had formed a sort-of smile. 

Then the sarcastic glint was back in his eyes. "Yes, Miss Granger," he said, rather sharply--- with the effect of sobering her at once--- "I'm well aware of my House's failings, chief among them being the twin sins of racism and inbreeding--- though if you ever breathe a word of that fact to another living soul, you'll live to regret it." 

If she hadn't been watching him closely, she'd have taken that statement as no more than his standard harshness. But she was, and so she saw the lines at the corners of his mouth and eyes deepen, the sudden harsh weight of exhaustion behind the sarcasm. 

She remembered the night, after Harry had won the Tri-Wizard Tournament, when Snape had shown Cornelius Fudge the Dark Mark on his arm... when Dumbledore had sent him on some mysterious and dreadful errand. And suddenly, she thought she understood... everything. 

"You're a double agent, aren't you?" she blurted--- then wanted to bite her tongue as he looked up at her, his eyes hard. 

He got to his feet, and she had to fight not to shrink back from that menacing figure. 

But he only stood behind his desk, regarding her narrowly. "Very good, Miss Granger. You have an eye for intrigue--- though apparently not the discretion for it." He came around the desk and stood in front of her, arms folded. "Yet another reason for me to wish you'd been in Slytherin--- a few months in the hallowed halls of the Serpents' Den would have honed the former and eliminated the latter." His eyes narrowed. "And need I tell you that tonight would be an excellent time for you to begin to practice that discretion?" 

She shook her head, looking at the floor to avoid those probing eyes. "No, sir." 

For a moment, all was silence. Then one long finger came under her chin, tipped her head back so that she had no choice but to meet his eyes. 

For a moment, they regarded each other, she nervously, he with a rather inscrutable look of evaluation in his dark eyes. "The finest mind for wizarding I've seen in a decade of teaching," he said ruefully, "and it had to belong to a Gryffindor Muggle-born. What a waste." 

Abruptly, he released her, turned his back and glided away. For a moment, all she could do was stare after him in astonishment as he made his way to his office. 

At the door he stopped, turned back to her, an expression of annoyance on his face. "Well, what are you waiting for?" he snapped. "Dismissed." 

Feeling obscurely and profoundly relieved by that display of temper, she left, in all seemly haste. 

Well, one thing was certain, she thought dryly, as she made her way through the darkened halls of Hogwarts back to Gryffindor house, there was absolutely no way she was telling anyone what happened in the Potions classroom tonight. 

Not unless she wanted a long stay at St. Mungo's and a lot of Calming Compound. No one would ever believe a word of it. 


	2. Chapter 1: Opening Moves

Chapter 1: Opening Moves   
  


Hermione wasn't at all shocked when Snape--- on a _very_flimsy pretext--- gave her another detention the next class. 

"I can't believe it!" said Ron as she joined the boys in the corridor. "You _never_ get detention--- and that's twice in a row!" 

Despite her resolve of last Friday, Hermione decided that the boys would believe at least part of the truth. "He seems to need an assistant with one of his experiments---" 

Harry rubbed his forehead, frowning. "So why doesn't he just, well, _ask?_" 

"Because he's Snape, that's why," Ron said in disgust. 

Hermione bit her tongue hard. It wasn't exactly possible to defend the man... but she had to admit that the taciturn and near-obsessively focused individual whose lab she shared was a completely different side of their cruel and sarcastic professor. And, the truth was, she wasn't sure that Harry and Ron would understand the difference. They hadn't even been able to tolerate her for the first weeks they'd known one another. 

That was the curse of being very, very intelligent. People didn't understand the difference between the frustration of trying to get a point across to a mind that just didn't _get_ it, and genuine disdain. And sometimes, it was pretty easy to forget the difference yourself. 

But she couldn't just listen to Ron put him down either. "Well, he can't exactly admit that one of the only students good enough to assist him is a Gryffindor, can he?" she asked. 

Ron gave her a _look_. "I think you've been spending too much time with him--- some of that snobbishness is starting to rub off. Faery Queen!" This to the Fat Lady, who swung open to let them into the Gryffindor sanctuary. 

"I wouldn't talk if I were you, dear," the portrait said sternly as they passed. 

"Don't they have that expression in the wizarding world, Ron?" Hermione asked innocently at her friend's baffled look, while Harry tried to smother a laugh.   
  


*****   
  
  
  


By the end of the month--- during which she received a detention following every Potions class--- the Slytherins had begun to scent blood in the water. 

"Hey, Granger," Draco Malfoy sneered as they passed each other in the hall, "detention again? Doesn't look good for your chances of being Head Girl, does it?" 

"Nice to see Little Miss Perfect come down from her high horse!" said one of the other Slytherins, a girl Hermione didn't know. 

"Ooh!" said Pansy Parkinson, clapping a hand to her mouth and squealing in malevolent delight--- her beady little eyes fixed hopefully, Hermione noticed, on Draco. "Maybe she figures on---" she leaned close and whispered something to Draco. 

Draco pounced on whatever it was with all the speed of a snake on a lame rat. "So that's your secret, Granger--- going to sleep your way to the Head Girl's badge?" 

Ron, walking next to her, would have gone for Malfoy's throat, but Harry held him back, glaring darkly at the pale-faced boy. It would be just like that Slytherin scum to arrange for Ron to get a detention for fighting over something _he'd _had said. 

Hermione turned to Malfoy with the air of someone only noticing a rather unpleasant object for the first time. "Well, I wouldn't know--- sleeping my way into a position of power seems more a Slytherin pastime, wouldn't you say, love?" She looked from Draco to Pansy with a slow insinuating gaze, then firmly grabbed hold of Ron's other arm and the three friends swept off. 

"Wow!" said Ron when he'd recovered himself. "That was dead brilliant, Hermione!" 

Harry, though, looked worried. "I wonder what Snape's game is?" 

Hermione shook her head impatiently. "I told you, he just needs an extra pair of hands on the anti-lycanthropy potion, that's all." She settled her bag on her shoulder. "Anyway, next week's Christmas--- he ought to be done by then, I'm going home for Christmas, and after the holidays it should all blow over." 

"Oh, God!" Ron smacked his forehead, stopping dead in the hallway. "You're leaving--- but Harry and I are staying over! Do you realize what this means?" 

"What?" Harry regarded him with some curiosity. 

"What if Snape tries to enlist one of us?" 

Hermione smothered a giggle. "Don't worry, Ron, he's only singled me out because of my top marks--- I seriously doubt he'd use a Gryffindor if he had a better option." 

"Especially," said Harry with feeling, "one of us three."   
  


*****   
  


Though very few people would have believed it, Christmas was Severus Snape's favorite time of the year. 

Not, of course, that he enjoyed any of the festivities--- the decorations and the feasting were his least favorite part of the holiday. But at Christmas, the halls of the school were almost empty. He had no classes to teach and plenty of time for his experiments--- and the early nights and cold reminded him of the best parts of his family home.... 

It was _usually_ quiet at Hogwarts around the holidays--- the students took their raucous behavior outside to throw snowballs or whatever else children did. Not that he'd ever known.... 

Which meant that the halls themselves were peacefully deserted--- and especially the corridor outside his rooms, the Potions classroom and his office and the small suite down the hall from those rooms that was his. 

_A rock to crawl under_. That was how he thought of his rooms in the dungeon, at any rate. It suited him, given what kind of things usually hid under rocks. 

_Something slimy, ugly, loathsome... _whispered a corner of his mind as he flipped through the notes that he and Granger had taken before the holidays. All words that aptly described a former Death Eater. 

He forced his attention back to the parchment, covered with calculations and observations in Hermione Granger's precise type-script tiny hand. Surprisingly good notes, too, near-professional quality. 

But then, he expected no less. He wouldn't have used her as an assistant otherwise. No, despite the face that his subterfuge forced him to show to his students--- the assumed preference for Lucius Malfoy's lazy get--- if he had to select a favorite student, it would have been Hermione Granger. 

For a moment, he allowed himself a brief guilty fantasy of what his life could have been: research, study, working with bright young minds like Granger's--- and _only_ the best students, those worthy of his knowledge--- 

"Ha!" He tossed the parchment onto the desk in disgust, sank back in his chair and stared unseeing at the fireplace that he always left empty despite the cold. Worthy--- yes, _worthy_, of a Death Eater's knowledge! That was a bad joke. And all those little Gryffindors and Ravenclaws and Hufflepuffs who thought him cruel and vicious--- they never dreamed he was doing them the greatest favor imaginable. Keeping them at a distance... and toughening them for the battle ahead. And the Slytherins, so smugly certain that their Head of House would cover for them, never dreamed that every point he gave them undeserved, every time he overlooked an error or covered up a fault was one more handicap, one more crippling of whatever native cleverness and wit they still possessed, making them that much less capable of surviving in the real world. The few of that lot with any brains at all he was careful to single out, to direct away from the cliques of baby Death Eaters that infested the Serpents' Den--- and careful _not_ to offer them the same easy path he did the others. 

Yes, at least he could serve _some_ purpose. 

As if that thought had been a signal, the fireplace sputtered and crackled--- and, almost without warning, a roll of parchment--- black on black sealed in black--- spat itself from the flames to land at his feet. 

Snape regarded it with loathing. "Lucius," he muttered, "must your every act advertise your allegiance to the world?" 

But the sarcasm didn't make the offensive message disappear--- not that he'd held out much hope. His fingers twitching in disgust, he picked up the roll, examined the seal. 

At his touch, the black wax glowed green, the Dark Mark standing out in sharp relief against the dark paper. 

Snape sighed, feeling his stomach churn. He should have known--- if Potter and his rabble didn't manage to spoil one of the few peaceful times in his life, Lucius Malfoy would. He broke the seal. 

"Your presence is requested," (the invitation read) "for a holiday celebration at Chateau Malfoy tomorrow evening at 8:00. Informal; RSVP acceptance only."   
  


He swallowed against the bile in his throat. So: there was to be a Dark Revel, one of the entertainments that Lucius and his petty follower had always enjoyed. And _without_ their Lord's presence. The Malfoys' estate in France would be a good place for that kind of thing, too--- the French wizarding community had been too little affected by Voldemort's depredations to be as watchful as the British. 

His stomach heaved again. Even in the days when he'd been a loyal Death Eater, devoted to the New World Order and the power that Voldemort offered... even then, he'd disdained the petty lusts and short-sighted, sadistic pleasures that men like Lucius enjoyed. 

And it was downright humiliating how long it had taken him to realize that those cruel pleasures were far more the true face of the Death Eaters than the dark knowledge he'd embraced. 

He'd avoided those gatherings in the old days--- but he had no choice but to grace this one with his presence. 

_RSVP acceptance only._

Meaning: you're either with us... or against us. 

He rolled up the parchment with a heavy sigh, summoned his own letterhead, and scratched a response. 

"Delighted, Lucius," he muttered. "As you bloody well know." 


	3. Chapter 2: A Pawn at Risk

Chapter 2: A Pawn At Risk   
  


Dumbledore hadn't wanted to let him go, but in the end, even the Headmaster was forced to admit that Snape had no choice but to attend. 

So he dosed himself with every possible antidote--- his former associates had interesting ideas of humor, and not all their little jokes were confined to their enemies--- dragged his dress robes from the back of the closet where he preferred to leave them, and ordered a carriage. He could, of course, have Apparated, or used Floo powder--- but he considered it safer not to drop himself into the midst of one of Lucius' little fetes unawares. To say nothing of the fact that Lucius and his crowd would respect the pomp and the display of wealth. In that respect, at least, he could compete with any of them--- Andropolous and Snape were both old wizarding families, and he was his parents' only child. 

In fact, he briefly considered using the family carriage--- then decided against it. Dealing with his mother was about the only thing that could make this holiday worse... and he knew he'd never be able to look his father in the face.... 

So it was a hired carriage that brought him to the door of Chateau Malfoy at exactly 8:15 by his watch--- fashionably late, his mother would have said (though his father would have insisted on a courteous punctuality). 

The place was, as its name implied, a castle, like Hogwarts--- or rather, like the antithesis of Hogwarts: a forbidding and imposing edifice designed, it seemed, for no other purpose than to impress visitors, passersby, and anyone else who had the misfortune to get within seeing distance of it. His carriage clipped through a massive portcullis guarding the drive; the "chateau" itself was all jagged angles and bared windows--- none of which were lit. Par for the course for a Dark Revel. 

He was mildly surprised to note that there were no house-elves to attend him as he exited the carriage and ordered it to wait--- then remembered that Potter had managed to lose Malfoy his servant some years back. His lips twitched. Served Lucius right--- and for once, Potter had been deliberately useful, instead of merely being in the right place at the wrong time and getting showered with adulation for it. 

Just like his father.... 

An appropriate set of thoughts for a Death Eater, he sneered to himself as he reached the front door. _That's it, Severus, get into character... remember just how far you _haven't_ come...._

The door opened, and a very frightened-looking house-elf--- blast, Lucius still had a few servants, did he?--- examined his invitation, took his cloak and hat, and ushered him downstairs. 

The dungeon. He remembered the place all too well, from previous... occasions. And--- no mistaking it--- he could hear certain well-remembered sounds echoing up from its depths as the terrified house-elf opened the door to the dungeons. 

"You may go," he told the creature coldly--- though in truth its near-panic made him ill--- "I know the way from here." 

The creature bobbled a nervous obeisance, then fled. 

Severus carefully closed the door behind the elf, took a moment to reswallow his stomach, then descended the steps. 

Into Hell. 

The stench hit him halfway down the torchlit stairway: blood and sweat and sex and terror. And he didn't know what was the worst: the ungodly sounds of pleasure in voices he remembered all too well--- the terrified cries and pleading in voices he didn't--- or the occasional, sudden silences that told of worse still. 

He exited the stairs to find Lucius holding court in the center of the dank stone chamber, a cluster of sycophants around him and a flagon of dragonsblood brandy in his hand. "Severus!" he called, in the too-loud voice of the drunk and sated, "So glad you could make it!" 

His greeting was punctuated by a scream. Severus stepped into the room--- over a prone corpse--- and said casually, "So am I." He let his lip curl at the corpse--- he'd never been fond of this sort of homicidal debauchery; to seem to embrace it now it would destroy his disguise just as surely as if he denounced them all. 

Lucius met his eyes nastily for a moment. "Oh, that's right, Severus--- you always were a spoilsport, weren't you?" 

Snape held the other man's eyes for a long moment; Lucius was drunk enough that he looked away first. "You remember the others, eh? Not your old crowd, as I recall--- except---" He looked round him. "Where the hell's Avery?" 

"In the back," drawled a sullen voice that matched Malfoy's for sheer overmonied indolence, "trying out that new sex-hex of his on a Mudblood---" 

_Mudblood._ Snape thought of Hermione Granger, and his stomach, already rallying itself for a protest, did an abrupt backflip. He cudgeled it into submission with the ease of long practice and addressed the speaker. "Patricia, my dear," he drawled, "how nice to see you." 

Patricia Parkinson, mother of the social-climbing Pansy, held out a bloodstained hand to him like a duchess in a drawing room. "So good to see you, too, Sevvie, dear," she said languidly. "Some of us were wondering if you'd show." 

To an outside observer, it might have sounded like an idle remark, but, given the wording of the invitation, Severus knew it for a challenge. "My dear," he said, stepping forward to take her hand and bring it to his lips--- forcing himself not to cringe away as the blood smeared his mouth--- "I wouldn't have missed it for the world. Though," he added, dryly, "given recent events, it doesn't seem as though I'll have to choose." 

Triumphant laughter greeted that remark, and two of the other Death Eaters made room for him at the table. 

Lucius laughed thickly, poured himself more brandy, and of course did not offer refills to the rest of the table. "I'm dreadfully glad to hear that, Severus," he said silkily, "be such a _shame_ to lose you to the other side---" 

"I'm not a fool, Lucius," Snape said calmly, leaning back in the chair. "Indeed---" he looked around him--- "to be frank, it's _your _wisdom I'd question at the moment." He flicked a hand round him casually. "Isn't this a tad... extravagant, considering the circumstances? I'd have thought it would make more sense to save the festivities for _after _our Lord's triumph--- when you won't have to dispose of the evidence in secret." He steepled his fingers, and looked at Lucius inquiringly. 

There was muttered comment from the others--- not all of it, Severus gathered, in Lucius' favor. But Malfoy raked the group with a glance, and they subsided. "Well, I'll admit it isn't the kind of showing we'd have been able to put on in the old days," he said, swigging the brandy with the casual attitude of a man who can treat hundred-Galleon liquor like butterbeer, "only a few... playthings--- what, six or seven?" He looked around. 

"Eight--- well, seven," said Patricia boredly, looking at the corpse at Snape's feet, "though it'll be six if Avery gets his way." She pouted. 

"Can't have that--- the night's only half-gone." Lucius flicked a glance at Andrew Crabbe and Victor Goyle (the fathers of Draco's two goons; he was certain the Crabbe and Goyle families plotted their whelping on the orders of the Malfoys, lest one of the spawn of the latter have to survive Real Life without attendant thugs). "Talk him out of it, will you? Get him to wait a few hours, let someone else have a turn." 

Malfoy's hulking thugs moved off, and Snape smothered a smile. Some things never did change. 

Lucius looked back at him over the rim of the glass. "As for the ones we do have, they'll never be missed," he drawled. "Muggles are so good at producing garbage--- their own society creates throwaways for our amusement, as if it were designed for no other purpose." The evil glint in his eye said that that was exactly what he thought. 

"And the Mudblood? Where do you find those?" 

"Same place," Lucius belched. "You know that, Severus--- half the Mudbloods go mad, living with Muggles and no one knowing their magic's for real. Find them the same places we find the other sort." He looked up, as Crabbe and Goyle came back, looking pleased. "Took care of it, did you?" Goyle nodded, and Lucius waved his hand. "Well, then, friends, I suggest you enjoy yourselves--- before Avery gets... frustrated... enough to start looking for other playmates." His laugh was unpleasant, and the group around him dispersed in a haste born half of lust and half of fear, until only Lucius and Severus were left at the table. 

Snape made to follow the others in haste, not wanting to be alone with Malfoy even in a crowded room, but Lucius' voice, silky-smooth and seductive, stopped him. 

"Funny you should mention Mudbloods, Snape," he said. "I've got a little surprise for you--- 'tis the season, and all." He chuckled and got to his feet. "Come along." 

Snape, trapped, had no choice but to follow the pale cold man, though his stomach renewed its protests and brought his heart into the rebellion at the thought of Lucius Malfoy's idea of a Christmas present for a man he despised. 

Lucius led him down one of the honeycomb passageways off the main room, to a thick wooden door at the end. He pulled out a key from his pocket, unlocked the heavy padlock. "In here---" He grinned cruelly. "Wouldn't want the others to get to your present first, now would we?" 

Snape tried to swallow, found that between the lump in his throat and the dryness in his mouth it wasn't happening. "Indeed. His heart was very loud in his ears. 

Lucius swung back the door, gestured for Severus to precede him. "See for yourself." 

Snape stepped into the room. 

And froze on the threshold, stunned quite out of his wits. 

Lying on a narrow cot in the cold, bare cell, stripped naked and bound hand and foot, and regarding him with heartfelt panic, was Hermione Granger. 

It took only a second for Snape to recover himself, but Lucius was already speaking. "Draco told me you'd taken to keeping this little Mudblood after hours--- and naturally, I figured you had a good use for her," he drawled, "so I thought I'd make it... _convenient_... for you to... indulge." 

Snape found his voice. "Are you out of your mind, Lucius?" he hissed. "For Merlin's sake, the girl has parents---" 

"Who have been informed that she was unavoidably delayed at Hogwarts," Malfoy said, and added with a snigger, "which is only the literal truth, since that's where we picked her up." He sobered, regarded Snape coolly. "Don't tell me you don't... appreciate it?" 

Snape got control of himself--- which wasn't easy, with Hermione Granger's frightened brown eyes boring into his skull. Thank Merlin the child at least knew he was a spy... she'd probably die of fright otherwise. 

On the other hand, given her present circumstances, death might be a better option. "I've never been one to bed children," he snapped, shaking. Dear Merlin... to rape one of his own students! The thought twisted his guts. Nothing was worth doing that to a mere child... a child who trusted him... whose eyes held the same spark he saw in the mirror, when he could stand to look at himself.... 

And it was _his_ fault she was here--- his own blasted stupid weakness, showing an interest in the child. _His fault._

The mask of camaraderie Lucius had worn began to slip away. "No, Severus," he said quietly, "you never were--- always a spoilsport, weren't you? Never knew how to indulge yourself like a normal man, always buried in your books and your potions." Malfoy stepped closer, until his face was an inch from Snape's. "Even now, lurking in that lair of yours at Hogwarts... you're not flesh and blood, Severus, you're a mechanical contrivance." He laughed and stepped back. "Fortunately, some of us know what to do with a woman---" He turned toward the bed, and Hermione, his face a study in sadistic anticipation. 

The girl's eyes widened still further, and whether it was courage or terror that had held her still until now, it broke, and she began to struggle. Lucius laughed. "How nice to be... appreciated---" 

"Lucius," Snape said coldly, a sudden painful clarity sweeping through his mind, cutting off the horror-static as if he'd thrown a switch, "You're a damn fool." 

Malfoy turned back to him, his eyes ugly. "What are you saying, _Severus_?" 

"I'm _saying_," Snape said coolly, gliding past him, "that you're about to waste the best opportunity imaginable." It made him sick to think about it--- about twisting a child's heart and soul--- yet the worst that he would do to her tonight was better than the best she could expect from Malfoy. _I'm sorry, Hermione._

Lucius regarded him with mocking skepticism. Snape spread his hands. "It's so _simple_," he said, tauntingly. "Why have a few moments' pleasure... when we can have the perfect pawn?" 

Now Malfoy looked interested. "What did you have in mind?" he asked. "The Imperius Curse?" 

Snape snorted. "Oh, Lucius, Lucius, you're a simple-minded brute sometimes, you know that?" He looked the other man in the eye. "You know a great deal about the pleasures of power... but you lack the subtlety to recognize the power of pleasure." 

Lucius' eyes narrowed, then widened in comprehension. "Perhaps I'm not as simple as you think, Severus," he said. "Why don't you show me?" He leaned back against the wall, shoving the door closed with one hand, and regarded Snape expectantly. 

"Oh, I intend to." And he turned back to the bed... and Hermione Granger. 

Who stared up at him with dawning horror in her eyes. 

His back to Malfoy, he let the mask slip a little--- a _very_little; he didn't trust the other man as far as he could throw this castle without magic. But it was safe, for a moment, to lock his eyes with those horrified, innocent ones--- _Trust me, child? Please--- for both our sakes?_

For a moment, they stared at each other--- no, she was too terrified, too traumatized already--- 

And then a miracle happened. 

She tore her gaze from his, looked past him at Malfoy. And, shivering horribly... subsided onto the bed. 

Snape smothered a sigh of relief, fixed the mask onto his face again, and shot a look over his shoulder at Lucius. "You've made my job easy, Lucius," he said. "Now, do me another favor--- don't interrupt." 

Lucius snorted. "All right, then." Not a pleasant sound... but Snape could read him better than most: Malfoy was curious, and his curiosity and cruelty both would hold him silent. 

Satisfied that Malfoy wouldn't ruin his efforts, he turned back to the girl. 

And turned up the silk, dialed a caressing, commanding warmth into his voice, a kind of cruel, half-mocking tenderness, a parody of a lover's tone... yet just sincere enough that her senses would register it as something welcome. "That's right, girl," he breathed, coming to sit next to her on the bed. "That's right... I'm the lesser of two evils, aren't I? That's a start." He brushed his fingers over her forehead, felt the pulse at the soft sensitive flesh of her temple. "And you want to make me happy, don't you? You know what will happen if you don't?" 

She swallowed--- her throat most likely as dry as his--- and nodded, once, shivering. 

"Yes... there's a good girl." He brought his fingers down over her eyebrows--- the ridges of hair silky-soft under his touch--- and coaxed her eyelids closed. "That's better, isn't it?" 

She nodded again, though it hadn't really been a question. 

Snape paused, his hand resting lightly on her face, her shallow breaths warm on the hollow of his palm. 

He drew a deep, slow, breath. 

_I'm so sorry, child...._

And began.   
  


*****   
  


Hermione Granger had never been so frightened in her life. 

She didn't remember much about the kidnapping--- one moment, she'd been crossing the barrier between Platform 9 & 3/4--- then next, she was here, in this room. 

With Lucius Malfoy standing in front of her. 

She'd stood her ground, bravely as she could--- but it had done her no good. With a word, he'd put her under the Petrificus Curse--- and with another, stripped her... then bound her to the bed using his own hands. 

At which point, she'd fully expected to be raped, but he simply left her tied up there, to await her fate. 

She'd lain there in the darkness, her mind conjuring up ever more gruesome scenarios for that fate--- deciding that whatever else happened to her, she wasn't going to give Lucius Malfoy the satisfaction of breaking her. Whatever he did, she had to stay sane... to _survive_... this: to survive, and escape, and try to get him punished for this. It was a grim thought but--- like Sirius' memory of his innocence--- it was something to hold onto. 

And then the door had opened, and Malfoy returned... with Professor Snape. 

_Snape_. She hadn't been certain whether to be relieved or terrified still more. _She_ knew where Snape's loyalties lay... but neither of them could afford to let _Malfoy_ know that. 

Which meant that there was absolutely no way out of the nightmare... except to trust him, and hope that he knew a way out of this. Even if it was just to kill her, and see to Malfoy's punishment himself--- which she was certain he would. 

She thought of his countless cruel remarks, of the times when she and her friends had been certain he meant to kill them or worse... and realized that Snape was probably perfectly willing to sacrifice her for what was unquestionably the greater good. She could only hope he'd have enough mercy to make it as quick as possible. 

She could hardly stand to listen to the conversation between him and Malfoy--- too appalling to hear herself discussed like a piece of meat--- but her heart almost stopped when Malfoy began to come toward her. 

She saw the cold horror on Snape's face, for just a second--- and then his expression hardened into a silkily vicious mask. 

Her heart pounding in her ears, she just barely made out Snape's words--- until a phrase sounded in her mind like a siren. 

_The power of pleasure._

Oh, God. _What_ was he going to do? 

And then he turned to her, his back to Malfoy, his face in shadow. 

And the icy mask slipped--- just a fraction. 

She couldn't look away from the dark eyes locked on hers. From the pleading in them--- and the remorse. 

Of a sudden, she remembered the night in the Potions lab, and his finger tilting her chin up so that their eyes met, and words of praise that she'd never expected from him. 

She heard his voice again: _"You have an eye for intrigue--- though apparently not the discretion for it."_

Time to learn. To keep her promise to herself. 

She steeled herself, and deliberately looked past him, at Malfoy... then back to those dark and desperate eyes. 

And, fighting against the panic in every nerve and muscle, made herself relax. 

Snape said something to Malfoy... and came and sat beside her on the bed. 

His nearness made her tremble, of a sudden, this obscene casual intimacy. She wanted to cover herself, to run, to hide.... 

And then he spoke. 

His voice was silky-soft, and quiet, and there was something in it that wormed its way under her skin and started to play with her tight-strung nerves, caressed them with something that was a threat and a promise in one. She found herself mesmerized by it, as if it were a silken thread leading her out of the labyrinth of terror in which she'd found herself. 

And all the while, his dark eyes locked on hers, with something that was at once a plea and a promise. 

It was a distinct relief when his long fingers brushed over her eyelids, closed them for her. Now there was only that voice, that wonderful, terrible voice.... 

And then he began to touch her. 

His hand slipped from her face, down to her throat, as his other hand came to rest on her opposite shoulder. His hands were warm, a welcome contrast to the chill of the dungeon; his touch was firm but very, very gentle... almost as if he thought she were made of glass. 

Which wasn't too far from how she felt--- fragile, breakable, as if one wrong move would shatter her. She shivered under his touch, her whole body harpstring taut. 

And then, slowly, easily, his hands slid lower--- firm strokes, his palms flat against her sides as he traced them down her ribs to her waist, to her hips, to her thighs--- 

"There," said that promising, threatening voice, "that's better, isn't it? Nothing to fear...." 

Unspoken: _yet._

His hands came back up her sides, leaving trails of warmth in their wake, making her shiver as they moved and lean into the warmth. This time, when he reached her shoulders, he traced his hands up her arms, bound over her head, his fingers flicking lightly into her hair, then brought his hands back down again to her shoulders, down her sides, then up.... One hand came to rest on her stomach, rubbed a warm circle, before continuing back up her ribs. 

And all the while, his voice caressed her, in half-understood whispers, threatened pleasure and promised pain. 

Her whole being narrowed to that touch, that wasn't pleasure and wasn't pain, that was simply _there_, and to the voice, guiding her and coaxing her--- she'd never thought his voice could sound like that, never imagined the safety and warmth of his long fingers, and it terrified her and shamed her to be so vulnerable. She tensed with every stroke of his hands, her body wound in knots--- 

And then, suddenly, a spasm shot through her, a violent seizure like the ones that sometimes wracked her on the verge of sleep, ripping through her bones and startling a little shriek out of her. 

In its wake she was limp on the narrow bed, like a puppet with its strings cut. 

And he laughed, in that silky terrible voice, and murmured, "Felt good, didn't it? Better now?" 

She couldn't help but nod. Because she did, because somehow the worst of the shame and the fear had melted with that shudder and she was weak with relief. 

He chuckled again, the sound seeming to touch places on her body that she'd never known were there, and murmured, "That's only the beginning...." 

And then his hands resumed their gentle progression along her sides... but with a difference. Now his fingers trailed along her flesh in a whisper of touch, as he left her sides with little flickering caresses, teasing, tempting, promising.... He was coaxing feeling out of spots that she hadn't imagined were this sensitive, warming her chilled skin inside and out.... 

And it seemed really no time at all before she was arching into those caresses, rubbing herself against his hands, whimpering softly as those wonderful fingers explored her body.... 

Quite intimately at times--- deft delicate flicks under her breasts, a teasing fingertip brushed over her inner thigh, then quickly withdrawn--- and at times no more than a friendly petting of her thighs or arms or stomach, so that she didn't know when suddenly the warm pleasant stroking would spark into real delight. She could only twist under the caresses and try to guide those hands to the places that wanted touching, could only beg for more.... 

Sometimes, he obliged her... sometimes. Other times he simply laughed, in that silken voice, and scolded gently, so that she lapsed back onto the bed and tried to hold herself still--- anything, anything, to keep him touching her and pleasing her.... 

Once, he drew his hand along her body, tracing a straight line from the tip of her nose down between her breasts past her navel, pulling away, bit by bit, so that she was forced to arch her back to maintain that delicious contact. And he laughed, and murmured, "A puppet on strings...." And did it again, and she felt vaguely that she ought to be ashamed, but she couldn't stop herself from rising to meet that touch.... 

And then, just when she was drowning in the ever more intimate pressure and pleasure of his hands and his voice--- both abruptly went away. 

She cried out in the silence, the sound torn from her throat, and he chuckled. "Want more, do you?" 

"Yes, oh yes...." She could barely recognize her own voice. 

She felt movement, and then his face was very close to hers, his breath warm and smelling of mint and lemon. "What would you do," he murmured--- cruel parody of intimacy--- "if I asked, hmmm? If I promised you..." a suggestive purr, "more?" 

She sobbed aloud. "Anything... anything...." 

A long pause, during which she shivered and shook with frustrated want. Then, very softly, ice and silk to her ears.... "Open your eyes. Look at me." 

Something told her she shouldn't, it would be a mistake... but the promise and the threat were there, and the thought of those hands was enough to overcome sense. 

She opened her eyes. 

And it was Snape's face above her, which she hadn't wanted to think about--- Snape, the sarcastic, the cruel; the greasy-haired and hook-nosed; her _professor_, for Merlin's sake.... 

Her professor, whom in the last weeks she'd come to admire, and for a minute here and there to like. 

Whom she'd never be able to look in the eye again. 

She turned her head to hide from him--- and that was a bigger mistake, because there was Lucius Malfoy leaning against the wall, his pale face flushed and his eyes avid and cruel. 

She gave a little cry and buried her face in one arm, closing her eyes against everything. 

And a gentle hand stroked her neck, moved lower to her chest in a warm caress. 

She shuddered, and couldn't look up, but that warm feeling was back, reminding her what those hands could do... if she did what he wanted. 

"Look at me," he ordered in that silken voice. The hand slid lower--- then stopped, drew away from her straining body. "Look at me." 

Slowly, shivering inside, she turned her head, opened her eyes. 

He looked back at her, his eyes intent on hers, the mask firmly in place, that little warm glint in his eyes that might be concern and might be something else altogether.... 

And his hand moved, with unerring instinct, to a _very_sensitive spot. 

He lingered there for an instant, then drew back. "You liked that, didn't you?" 

She gasped, nodded, not trusting her voice. 

"Say it." That silky-smooth voice brooked no defiance. 

"Yes. I liked it." Oh, dear _God_, she was going to die of shame. 

His fingers played over her body again, and, helpless now under his touch, seeking the pleasure as much to escape from this horrid reality as for itself, she twisted up under the caress. It was good, so good.... 

He chuckled wickedly. "And that?" 

"Yes." _Don't let him stop, please don't let him stop.... _

_Please let me die, now._

"You want more...." Another lingering caress, the most intimate yet, drawing back quickly before she had a chance to register more than the moment's flash of shameful pleasure. "Don't you?" 

She sobbed aloud. "Yes, oh, yes...." 

Gentle fingers caught her chin, turned her head. "Look at me when you say it. Look me in the eye and tell me...." He caught his breath. "Tell me you want me." 

No, no, why was he doing this? She couldn't say it... and yet--- flash of shameful shock--- it was true. She did want him, wanted those hands and that voice, had never wanted anything more in her life.... 

"I want you---" flash of insight, she decided to say it before he could make her, let this one small act be hers to control--- "I want you, P-professor Snape." 

His eyes widened at that--- for a moment, the mask seemed to slip a little, revealing something she couldn't fathom--- 

And then it was back in place and he laughed, that deep and silken caress. "Good girl," he said softly. "Very good indeed...." Flash of the black eyes. "I think that deserves a little reward, hmm?" 

And then his long fingers trailed over her body, stroked down over her stomach... and moved lower. 

She arched against the pleasure, rubbing herself up against that light soft touch that teased and promised... and this time, she kept her eyes on his. 

"Good girl," he murmured again... and then the caresses deepened in their intensity, weaving a warm cocoon about her that protected her from the fear and the horror that she knew was just on the edge of her awareness, and she gave herself up to it gratefully, because it was safe, because it was a welcome alternative to the horror and the fear. And she let herself yield to the deft fingers bringing a pleasure so intense it was painful.... 

Suddenly, it _was_ pain, as that caress became a pinch, and she yelped and shivered--- but the pain was almost good, was a relief after the intense delight, and she looked into his eyes and saw the knowing glint and knew he had done it on purpose. 

And then for a long time he touched her that way, and now it was truly maddening, because she never knew when the exquisite pleasure would suddenly sharpen into pain, and she sobbed and cried and begged for some relief. 

But she never looked away from his eyes. 

After a time, she didn't want to, because those eyes caressed her like his hands did, a probing, knowing touch that reached something deep inside of her. And the look in them--- that lingering hint of kindness beneath the glitter--- was like a silken thread and she knew if she followed it, it would lead her to safety. 

And slowly, the world blurred into the dark eyes that raked her with caresses and the deep silken voice and those deft knowing fingers that brought her spiraling steadily upward to a kind of delight she had never imagined.... 

And then all her senses exploded, waves of ecstasy ripping through her body like lightning, and for one shining moment there was nothing but pure physical delight and release--- 

And then the waves receded and took her with them, down into a dark safe place where there was only warmth and peace....   
  


*****   
  


Snape wiped his fingers on the mattress, took a deep breath, thankful for the cold air and the torchlit darkness. 

He touched Hermione's neck, felt for a pulse, careful to keep the contact impersonal, mindful of Malfoy's eyes on them. The blood beneath his fingers moved in steady waves; she was fine, then, simply overwhelmed by the sensations. 

_For which favor much thanks._ It was better for her to be unconscious, safely in Morpheus' care, while he bargained their way out. 

He looked up at Lucius, the mask he'd made of his features feeling stiff, fevered. "A few more sessions of that," he said lazily, "and she'd slit Potter's throat herself if I told her to." 

Lucius pushed himself indolently off the wall. "I'd say you have the little Mudblood pretty well under your command as it is," he said, then added, with a sneer, "I wouldn't have imagined any woman, even filth like that, could say she wanted _you_ with a straight face." 

Snape regarded him coldly, but inside he felt a bleak sort of exultation. That had been a cruel gambit to play with the poor child--- but clearly it had proved his point to Lucius: Hermione was completely under his control. "I suppose your bedmates put up with your sadism then, in exchange for your pretty face," he sneered, "or is it your money?" 

Lucius' face contorted in anger--- then, suddenly, he laughed. "That's the difference between us, Severus," he said snidely. "I don't give a damn what a woman in my bed wants... as long as she does what I want." 

Snape felt his stomach heave, but he kept the sneer fixed on his face. "After tonight's... demonstration... you still say that?" he laughed. "You _are_ a brute, Lucius, do you know that?" Before Malfoy could respond, he added, "And now, I hate to rush off--- but it would be as well for my purpose if little Miss Granger wakes up somewhere more welcoming than this---" he waved his hand around the dank dungeon. "So, if you'll excuse me, Lucius---" He touched his wand in its concealed pocket, muttered a series of charms--- and Hermione was quite abruptly dressed in her school robes. He flicked the wand at her, and she rose into the air, hovering above the bed. 

Lucius gave him a long thoughtful look. "You'd better go out the back way," he said finally. "The others won't think as much of your... purpose... as I'm beginning to." 

Snape restrained himself from doing a double take by main force of will. "A Malfoy? Impressed? The world will surely crack in two with shock." 

But he didn't refuse the hand Lucius held out. 

Nor could the rising tide of guilt and self-loathing chewing his guts alive entirely obliterate the twinge of satisfaction he felt. He'd _known_ this little show would be exactly to Lucius Malfoy's tastes... even if the man couldn't quite bring himself to admit it. 

But he only gestured for his host to proceed him out of the chamber. "Lead the way, then." 

_Author's Note: Those of you who have read J. L. Matthews' "Slytherin Rising" will immediately note the "abusing someone to save her life" parallel. I swear upon my dubious Slytherin honor VEG that I had the notion courtesy of the Cherryh/King gestalt, but JLM's fic is wonderful in its own right--- go read it (when you're done here, of course ;). _


	4. Chapter 3: The White King

Further update: Hermione is now eighteen for CMA reasons. As you will see below, it was NEVER in a million years my intent to make this story child-pornography.   
  


That said, I do have a huge problem with a legal system that allows things like teenage boys being made the guardians of their underage wives (yes, this happens, in the US, I know of at least one case myself!) but forbids something like Pawn to Queen to be written/posted.   
  


Due to recent events involving Ms. Rowling's perfectly reasonable statement that she does not approve of anything resembling kiddie-porn being written about her novels, I have increased Hermione's age, first to seventeen, now to eighteen. The original adjustment to the age of seventeen was actually supported by canon, as several of my readers were quick to point out to me before the age-of-consent issue ever came up, and I had planned to make that adjustment anyway. The second adjustment required further finagles on my part but I have made them in order to be in compliance with applicable law.   
  


That said, when I wrote this story, I had been under the impression, supported by my British friends, that the age-of-consent for sexual intercourse in the United Kingdom was sixteen, not seventeen; the age-of-consent in the area where I'm writing is sixteen. It was never my intention to write this story as child pornography.   
  


(That said, I have never understood the point of "magic ages"; in my own perfect imaginary world, everything would be based on developmental stage, not chronology. There, got that off my chest. Moving on.)   
  


For those of you who have asked, I plan a truly massive update to ff.net sometime after the holidays. In the meantime, if you want to find more PtQ and get updates, you can go to the following lists:   
  


http://groups.yahoo.com/group/snapefics   
  


http://groups.yahoo.com/group/whenikissedtheteacher.   
  


Again for legal reasons I will point out that the latter list, while being Snape/Hermione, does not in any way encourage child pornography or abusive situations. One of the stipulations of the list is that Hermione be of legal age in posted stories.   
  
  
  


Chapter 3: The White King   
  


Once in the carriage, Snape floated Hermione onto one of the bench seats--- but kept his wand out. 

"You'll forgive me, Lucius," he said to the air, "but I don't much fancy putting on another show for you tonight." And he cast the strongest Privacy Charm he knew. 

There, that ought to deal with whatever listening enchantments Malfoy had put on the vehicle. He hadn't bothered to protect against them, going in, as it might have been useful to let Malfoy--- or Voldemort--- see and hear him afterwards. He could have given them quite a show.... 

If he'd been alone. At the moment, Hermione Granger's sanity was vastly more important to him than embellishing his deception. 

He found a lap robe in a compartment under the seat, drew it over her gently, then settled across from her as the carriage started to move. 

She was still out cold; powerful reaction she must have had.... 

As if that thought had been a signal, he began to shake all over, writhing as violently as she had, under his hands.... 

Oh, God. Under his hands... that soft warmth moving under his touch, and her little moans of pleasure and want, the way she'd said his name.... 

Unbidden, his body reacted at the memory--- reacted as it had in that miserable little room in Lucius Malfoy's psychotic excuse for a cellar. Waves of heat coursing through him, and that solid and localized ache that he hadn't felt in nearly two decades.... 

What he'd said to Malfoy was true: he wasn't one for bedding children. He'd never even thought of looking at a student. Hermione hadn't been beautiful to him--- except, perhaps, in a detached and academic fashion, an aesthetic awareness of a loveliness as much a matter of mind and spirit as flesh--- in the classroom, even after evenings spent in one another's company. She certainly hadn't been beautiful to him lying helpless and terrified bound to that cot in Malfoy's dungeon--- his strongest desire then had been to cover her, to shield her from the horror in that place and spirit her away. 

But--- Merlin help him--- when he'd begun to touch her, in that infinitely careful knowing fashion he'd learned when he was younger than she was, when the fear had shuddered its way out of her body and she'd begun to relax under his ministrations, to take pleasure of him... then she had become beautiful to his starved eyes. 

He leaned his head on the wall of the carriage behind him and closed his eyes as the memory swept over him. Hermione, melting and yielding under his hands, her head thrown back and her lips--- fuller and redder than normal--- just slightly parted to allow the soft moans to escape them. 

He'd wanted to kiss her. To cover her face with kisses and taste her lips and feel them open to him, to brush his mouth over the sensitive places that his fingers had discovered, to have the various tastes of her skin on his tongue.... He could only thank whatever powers might have spared a moment of mercy for him that such tender intimacy was completely out of the question, that the cold manipulation he'd planned required nothing less than the appearance of complete detachment as he used her own wants to bend her to his will. 

And another memory, that encompassed everything he felt about that evening. Hermione, her eyes on his, whispering in a voice shaky with something he wanted to call desire, "I want you, Professor Snape." 

The contradiction was painful. Words a student should never say--- a microcosm of the whole situation. 

And more. She had read his mind perfectly, had played his game to the hilt. This inexperienced, innocent, guileless little Gryffindor... this child, in the most nightmarish situation imaginable (well, no, his mind insisted, the scene down the hall would have been worse, but it was still horrific) had outplayed a Slytherin at a Slytherin's game. 

If it had been playing. Which was a different kind of nightmare, for them both.... 

Merlin's bones. What kind of a monster was he, to want her, after that? 

And it was his fault she'd been subjected to it, his and his alone. Malfoy had thought of her because he, blind, selfish fool that he was, had made the grievous error of showing an interest in a student outside Slytherin. And in Malfoy's twisted paradigm, such interest in a female Mudblood meant only one thing.... 

Or rather, it would mean only one thing for a true Death Eater. Tonight had been both a reward and a test. 

And this child had paid the price for his weakness. 

Oh, Hermione. 

What in Merlin's name could he say to the girl when she woke? What could he possibly do to heal the damage that he had done to her--- done out of necessity, but done nonetheless? 

And how could ever atone for the unforgivable crime of the longing that coursed through his very bones? 

He leaned forward and buried his head in his hands.   
  


*****   
  


It was very warm, cozy, under the blanket, and her body felt quite deliciously relaxed, and she wanted to revel in the feeling.... 

Except that something horrible hovered at the edges of her consciousness, the sort of something that one usually only found in nightmares.... 

She shied away from that thought, pushed it to the back of her mind, and stretched--- 

Her feet bumped into something hard. And, come to think of it, the smooth leather under her cheek felt nothing like her bed either at home or at school.... 

She sat up, letting the blanket slide off her shoulders. 

She was in a carriage, clopping along at some speed. 

And sitting across from her, raising his head from his hands at her movement, his lank hair falling into his eyes--- was Professor Snape. 

She opened her mouth to ask what was going on... and then she remembered. 

Mr. Malfoy's sneering face and the ropes holding her hands above her head--- Snape's eyes on her, pleading and promising--- his soft caressing voice and warm hands... and the pleasure.... 

The horrible moment of looking into his eyes and knowing that she could never, never face him again, not without thinking of that moment... not without wanting what she now knew he could do to her. And then his hands making her forget--- for a while--- and bringing merciful delight and oblivion.... 

She pressed her lips together, but not before the first sob managed to escape. The tears started to creep down her cheeks and she couldn't get enough of a breath with her lips clamped shut but when she parted them to breathe the sobs got out, and she couldn't look at him and so she dropped her head into her hands to hide--- 

"Sweet---" She couldn't help but flinch at the endearment, so close to something a lover might say, and he looked away, then back. "Child." That she could stand, with its careful establishment of the barrier of age and role. His voice was soft, low, but there was none of that cruel tenderness in it--- only something infinitely sad and remorseful, that drew her out of hiding from sheer startlement. 

"Y-yes?" It came out between a gulp and a hiccup. 

He drew a deep breath and through the tear-haze she saw that his eyes were very dark and sunken in their sockets like a skeleton's. "I cannot apologize for saving your life---" 

He reached out, brought one hand toward her face, and she wanted to flinch away but a part of her remembered that this was not his fault and so she stayed still as his long fingers curled around her jaw. "But that does not mean," he said hollowly, "that I am not aware of the very great harm which I have done you." 

For a moment, she couldn't speak--- because she never would have expected such compassion from him... and because the touch of his hand, gentle and impersonal and even brotherly as it was, evoked guiltily delicious memories of what that hand could do to her... for her.... 

She gasped, the tears burning dry in her eyes--- and his eyes on hers widened slightly and he pulled away, leaned back in his seat and looked at the curtained window. "I am truly sorry," he said finally, in a low voice devoid of anything but despair. 

She couldn't find the words, could only curl up tight in her seat and never mind the dignity of an almost-adult, tonight she felt more like a child than she ever had in her life--- and try to sort thoughts. 

They wouldn't sort; they just jumbled together in a heap of vivid sensations and emotions, until all she wanted to do was hide. And her own body wasn't a shelter any more, wasn't the safe place to hide that the lump she'd made of herself wanted to be, because he could touch her and draw her out and make her feel only what he wanted her to feel.... 

Except that she had wanted it, had wanted the warmth, had wanted the exquisite escape from fear and horror that his touch offered, had wanted the delicate deft control he took of her and the raw powerful pleasure. She had yielded to him and welcomed him because there was no other option in that place; but a nagging little voice asked the question she didn't want to think about--- would she have wanted it if there had been another way? 

And however much she might try to fight it, the answer was yes. 

Something warm and heavy settled over her, and she started violently; but it was only the blanket, coming to rest over her shoulders and curl itself around her. She poked her head up over the hem and saw Snape, holding his wand; wisely, he had used magic to cover her, rather than touch her himself. 

They regarded each other for a moment, solemn and uncertain; then he spoke. 

"Child--- Hermione--- if you believe me about nothing else regarding this night, about nothing else as long as I live, believe this: you have no cause to feel shame for what took place tonight. You conducted yourself---" his lips twitched--- "with a courage that Godric Gryffindor himself would envy, and a cunning beyond the wit of most Slytherins." He held up a hand when she would have spoken. "And yes, I know that your response to me was not artifice; nor should it have been. Your... reaction... was the best one possible under the circumstances, as I believe you will see once the immediate horror of the occasion has a chance to fade." He seemed about to continue, then to think better of it. "You are in no condition for an involved discussion of... tonight's events, nor do I expect you to be. But...." He seemed to struggle with himself, then added, "rest assured that I will do all within my power to heal the wounds I left tonight." He looked away, biting his lip, as if revealing that much of himself had hurt. 

Hermione was surprised to feel an almost vicious satisfaction well up inside her. She had revealed far more of herself to him tonight than she had ever wanted to--- it was only right if he had a few awkward moments along the way! 

He got himself under control after a moment, looked back at her. "You should sleep again, if you can," he told her. "When we get back to Hogwarts, I'll take you to Dumbledore---" A bleak look crossed his face. "He should know of this at once." 

A quick shot of calm went through her at the thought of Albus Dumbledore--- followed by a shock of shame. "I don't want---" 

A flash of that all too familiar glitter in his eyes silenced her; tonight it was lightning in her stomach and she flinched. Immediately, his eyes softened, though that bleakness lingered. "Child," he said gently, "the only one who should be ashamed of tonight's events is I." 

There was something so horrible in that despair, something sickening about it, and her intellect took over where her emotions left off. "Well, I rather think Lucius Malfoy ought to have a hard time looking in mirrors, too, don't you? Only he hasn't got the conscience to be ashamed of his own face." 

Snape regarded her in astonishment--- then he laughed softly. "You are a marvel, child," he said, his voice very gentle and just the tiniest bit--- she thought--- impressed. It warmed her deep down--- and then she wondered why she cared what he thought, after tonight. 

Then he reached out and brushed his fingers through her hair, and she didn't have to wonder, because her body knew his touch and wanted it, and she tipped her head into his hand before she could think about it. 

He let his fingers linger a moment, then drew back. "Rest," he said gently. "We'll be there soon enough." 

And there was nothing that made more sense to do than to lean back on the soft seat and curl under the blanket and try not to think.   
  


*****   
  


She must have managed to doze off, which was a miracle in itself, for the next thing she knew, the carriage had come to a complete stop. "What?" 

"We're home, child," said Snape's voice, still in the gentle dispassionate tone. For a moment, she tried to make sense of that in her mind--- home was her parents' house outside London--- and then he clarified, "Hogwarts." 

She sat up, pushing the blanket back, and tried to shake the sleep from her brain and her thoughts into some kind of order. 

One of the thoughts that shook out was, He thinks of Hogwarts as home. She wasn't sure exactly what that meant or why it even occurred to her, but she filed it away for future reference. 

Snape waited, with his customary impatience either taking leave for the holidays or well-hidden, then got to his feet and opened the carriage door. 

A wave of cold air swept over her and she shivered. "I haven't got a cloak." 

Snape muttered something that would have lost a Gryffindor student twenty points if they'd said it in his hearing, and she cringed. Hastily, he said, "That was most emphatically notdirected at you, child---" He took off his cloak, swept it around her shoulders before she could protest. "Here." 

"But---" She bit her lip on the question, suddenly not wanting to argue, feeling that a protest was more than she could manage at the moment. 

"You're in shock," he said, not unkindly, "or you should be--- and that wants warmth. I'll be fine," he added, as she tried to frame a response--- then, with a kind of bitter sarcasm that seemed directed at himself, "you certainly shouldn't waste your concern on me." 

Remembering the chill of the Potions lab, and the fireplace that was always cold, even in the dead of winter, she had to believe him--- but she wondered at the bitterness in his voice. 

"Come, child," he said, his voice dispassionate again and gentle. "We should see Dumbledore--- he's probably waited up," he added in a dark undertone. 

They were across the dark courtyard and almost inside the great doors of Hogwarts before the substance of his remark penetrated her fogged wits. "Why would Dumbledore be waiting up for us?" 

Snape looked down at her with something like approval. "Very good--- I hadn't thought you'd catch that." The doors opened at his touch and they went in. "The first reason is because he knew about the... invitation---" his tone made the word into something foul, and she couldn't help but agree--- "that I'd received, and I'm expected to report to him." He took the cloak from her, draped it over his arm. "The second is because I'd be very much surprised if he weren't aware that you'd been taken." 

She nodded; she'd always been convinced that there wasn't much in the wizarding world that Dumbledore didn't know about. 

Again, they were several corridors deep into Hogwarts before she could frame her next thought. "What kind of invitation was--- I mean, what did Mr. Malfoy--- I mean, I don't think even Lucius Malfoy's stupid enough to come out and say he was inviting you to rape one of your students---" 

She broke off in midsentence, because Snape had stopped dead in his tracks and was staring at her. "Child, you are a true marvel," he said in a voice tinged with awe. "An absolute wonder. After what you've been through---" he broke off, shaking his head softly, continued walking. "The event, child," he said in a normal tone of voice, dry and didactic, "was called a Dark Revel---" his lip twisted--- "basically, an opportunity for Lord Voldemort's followers to get together and indulge some of their more depraved pleasures." His eyes were dark and hollow and cold. "Even when I wore the Dark Mark with pride instead of loathing, I considered those... homicidal orgies... an abomination." She cringed at the loathing in his voice--- a disgust and hatred that she sensed was as much for himself as for the acts involved. 

She said nothing more, and he certainly didn't seem inclined to talk, and they made their way to the door of Dumbledore's office in a silence that was neither tense nor companionable. 

He let them into the anteroom of the Headmaster's quarters (the password tonight, Hermione noticed with a little flutter in her stomach, was "dark chocolate", disturbingly apt), then stopped, turned to her. "Child, it would be adding insult to the very grave injury I have done you to ask if you are 'all right'," he said, "but... can you manage to stay by yourself for a little while, while I speak to the Headmaster in private?" 

She wondered what he'd do if she said no, then decided not to think about it. She really didn't want anyone knowing any more about tonight than they had to. "Yes," she said simply. 

"Good." He touched something on the wall, and a series of torches flared into life. 

There was a huge spiral staircase doing a fair imitation of an escalator, and, beyond it a small alcove, not even a room, that held a few chairs and a fireplace. Snape went to the fireplace, tapped one of the huge stone dragons on either side of it--- and the statue came to life, turned its head, and blew into the fireplace, leaving a cheery blaze before it returned to its moribund state. 

"Wait here," he said, sweeping past her toward the spiral escalator. He stopped by her side, caught up his cloak and draped it gently around her shoulders, without comment, then headed up the stairs. 

When he'd gone, it was like someone had sucked all the air and the warmth from the room. Hermione stared after him, astonished by the panic that crept into her mind at his leaving, the need for his nearness, that she never would have expected.... 

But he was gone, and she had to wait here for him. And at least she had his cloak. She wrapped it tightly around her and went to the most comfortable-looking of the chairs, a huge piece with wings that actually looked capable of flight, and curled up in its upholstered embrace. 

Snape's cloak was snug around her shoulders; she shivered and wrapped herself tighter in its folds, that felt almost like arms around her, cuddling her and soothing her.... 

Oh, God. She lowered her head onto the arm of the chair--- not a long drop, the chair was quite big enough for someone Hagrid's size to be comfortable in--- and began to cry.   
  


****   
  


Snape let the spiral staircase draw him higher, even as his stomach sank ever lower. 

He couldn't drag his mind way from the moments in the carriage when she'd responded to his touch--- Merlin's bones! Had anyone ever reacted like that when he touched them? Yet he knew it wasn't her idea at all, was only his own manipulation and perhaps her desperation that made his touch anything better than repulsive to her. 

Who in her right mind would want--- me? 

The stairs brought him to the door of Dumbledore's study--- which opened at his touch. The Headmaster most certainly did expect him, then. 

"Headmaster Dumbledore?" he asked, his voice coming out a hoarse croak--- as if in penance for the silken tones with which he'd abused Hermione. 

"Severus?" came Dumbledore's voice--- no mistaking the outright worry there. "We have a situation." 

"Hermione Granger." He came into the study, to find Dumbledore pacing in front of the fireplace. 

The Headmaster stared at him. "How did you--- is she---" 

"She's downstairs." He closed the door, stood by it, feeling appallingly as he had on those occasions in his student days when he'd been called up here to "discuss" some infraction of the rules. 

Dumbledore heaved a great sigh of relief and sank into his chair by the fire. "Thank Merlin." He rubbed his face roughly. "Where was---" He caught sight of Snape's face and waved him into a chair. "Sit, man--- you look---" 

"Worse than usual?" Snape asked bitterly, taking the offered chair. 

Dumbledore's face softened. "That wasn't what I was about to say, Severus, and you know it." He made a gesture with his wand, and two large snifters of brandy came to rest on the table between them. "Have a drink." 

Snape wondered if it were the same vintage as Lucius Malfoy had been drinking. "I couldn't," he said thickly. "Headmaster---" 

"Severus, as much I need to hear your report, I think I had better see to Miss Granger first---" He rose from the chair. 

"That's--- part of my 'report.'" At the hollow ring in his voice, Dumbledore turned back to regard him, the normally merry eyes dark with concern and startlement. 

Dumbledore moved slowly and deliberately back to his chair. "What do you mean?" he asked, in a quiet voice that only a fool would mistake for softness. 

"Lucius Malfoy kidnaped her," Snape said wretchedly. "Brought her to the Dark Revel---" 

"Merlin's teeth!" 

"--- as a present for me." He sank back in his chair and regarded Dumbledore miserably. 

The Headmaster leaned back in his chair, took several slow, deep breaths. "You don't mean---" 

"Yes." Snape ran his fingers through his hair, dragging it out of his face. "His... offspring had told him I'd been keeping... Miss Granger for an unusual number of detentions lately---" he'd told Dumbledore about using her as an assistant with the anti-lycanthropy potion--- "and, Lucius being Lucius, he made... assumptions about my 'true purpose' for the girl." 

Dumbledore was very silent for a long moment, then he said softly, "What did you do?" 

Snape opened his mouth to speak--- nearly gagged, his stomach managing one last rebellion. He swallowed convulsively, closed his eyes. "What I had to. Used what... Ellen Wilkes---" strange how it was still hard to say her name--- "taught me." He added harshly, imagining Dumbledore's disgust and revulsion. "It was that, or let Malfoy have his way with her." 

"I know." He opened his eyes in shock at the wealth of compassion in the Headmaster's voice. "I know you wouldn't have hurt one of your students that way for anything---" 

"Ha!" The sharp sound startled them both. "You give me too much credit, Headmaster," he said bleakly, feeling the awful confession force its way to the surface. "I enjoyed it," he croaked. "Having her under my hands... wanting me...." The last two words were a harsh whisper, and he hid his face in his hands. "She's a child, for Merlin's sake--- a child---" 

"Actually," Dumbledore said dryly, startling him, "technically, she's not." 

"I can count," Snape said dryly, his trademark sarcasm at least standing him in good stead. "She's fifth year, Headmaster---" 

"Her birthday was sixteen years ago, granted, but she's actually eighteen." As Snape stared, Dumbledore got to his feet, walked across to the claw-footed desk and drew out a sheaf of parchment, brought it over to him and held it out. "Read." 

The parchment was bound by a ribbon bearing the Ministry of Magic seal; Snape slipped a nail under it, unrolled it... and stared. "You're joking." 

Dumbledore managed a ghost of his usual warm smile. "She is rather overzealous, isn't she? I've seen a few students add extra months to their lives with the aid of a Time-Turner, but Miss Granger's the first to get herself two years out of it in only three terms--- not even Claudia Teasdale managed that much. And Hermione was already one of the oldest in her class." He sobered. "Since she was underage at the time, the Ministry had to document the extra months very carefully--- but if you'll read through the time-charts, she is a legal adult, Severus--- she's lived eighteen years." The Headmaster's expression was grave. "So you can put your conscience to rest on that score at least---" 

"Oh, yes," Snape said bitterly, "I can console myself that at least I abused an adult woman, rather than a child---" 

"You had no choice," Dumbledore said impassively. "As you pointed out, better yourself than Lucius Malfoy." 

There was silence in the room for a long time, punctuated only by the crackle of the fire. Then Dumbledore spoke again, in a more businesslike tone, "I thought those techniques were only designed for interrogation---" 

"And conditioning," Snape said, not looking up. "'The power of pleasure,' as I told Lucius. Told him I'd turn her into the perfect pawn--- a creature who'd betray her own closest friends, meaning of course Potter, in return for my touch." 

"Ah." Again, silence, while Snape could only feel his own skin crawling with self-loathing. 

A soft note made him look up: Fawkes, the Headmaster's phoenix, had come swooping into the room. Settling on the back of Snape's chair, the bird began to sing. 

It was like soft cool water flowing over the slimy disgust in his soul, washing the worst of it away. He closed his eyes, leaned back in the chair, and let the bird's voice soothe him, as unworthy of such comfort as he was. 

There was silence when the phoenix ceased, then "You see?" Dumbledore's voice came like a counterpoint to the bird's healing song. "Even Fawkes doesn't consider you guilty. You did what was necessary to save that young lady; what you felt or feel about those actions is irrelevant unless you allow it to interfere with what you must do." 

Snape felt the knots loosen in his guts. Dumbledore wasn't one to mince words and if he'd considered Snape to be in the wrong he would have said so. 

"You know far better than I what kind of care Miss Granger will need if she's going to recover," Dumbledore continued impassively. "And I expect you to provide it." 

The suddenness of that command made him start violently. "Headmaster---" 

"Yes, Severus, I know what I'm asking of you." Dumbledore's voice brooked no argument--- then softened. "Consider it your penance, my friend--- that's a logic I know you understand." 

He shivered at the memory the words called up. Sitting in the office Dumbledore had kept at the Ministry, and an offer of atonement. 

"You're a double-agent, aren't you?" Hermione's words to him. That had been his first penance; this, his second. 

He rather thought the first would be easier. This child... had come to matter to him, even if it was no more than his sense of responsibility, a conscience awakened late in life, that made it so. 

A conscience, and his own selfish want. 

Merlin help the poor girl. 

"And now," Dumbledore's voice broke in on his bleak reflections, "if you have nothing more to report---" 

"Not much." He gave the Headmaster the names of those at the Revel, added, "Avery appears to be up to his old tricks---" he'd been famous for sex curses at school, to the point that, pureblood though he was, there wasn't a girl even in Slytherin who'd allow herself to be caught alone with him by the time he left--- "and Patricia Parkinson had enough blood on her hands to suggest she'd been washing them in it." 

"Very likely," Dumbledore said hollowly, and Snape shivered inside at the sound. Childish as it was, he'd found that he somehow needed to believe in the Headmaster's omnipotence, to believe that here at least was a place for something like the safety and certainty that he'd never known as a child. 

Perhaps Dumbledore could read his mind, or perhaps--- sin of sins for a spy--- he'd allowed something of those thoughts to show on his face, for the older man's expression firmed and strengthened. "In that case," he said, "I think it's time you brought Miss Granger up." 

Time and past, probably. "All right." He got to his feet, headed for the door. 

"Severus." The Headmaster's voice stopped him, and he turned. "Remember what I've said--- that young woman's journey out of a dungeon has only just begun, and you're the one person who knows the way back to the light." 

The notion of himself having any understanding of light, or warmth, or humanity, let alone enough to rescue a badly wounded womanchild, was nearly enough to draw a laugh from him, but he only nodded. "I understand," he said quietly. 

And went out the door.   
  


*****   
  


Hermione looked up as a pair of soft footsteps drew near. "Child?" 

His voice went through her, a blot of warm soft lightning, bringing with it relief and apprehension. She brought her head around, all too aware of the tearstains on her face. "Yes?" 

"The headmaster wants to see you." He came closer, into the warm glow of the fire, and his eyes widened slightly at the tearstains. 

Then, before she could frame a comment, he'd dropped to one knee beside her--- which put his head a little below level with hers--- and reached up, brushing the tears from her face with one long finger. 

The touch sent a warm jolt through her body, and she quivered. "You have done nothing to be ashamed of, child--- remember that." He stroked her cheek lightly with the palm of his hand, then rose gracefully to his feet and held that same hand out to her. "Come?" It ought to have been a command, but the uncertainty in his tone made it a question. 

She put her hand in his--- felt the spark snap between them. 

God, she wanted to pull away... and she wanted to melt into his touch. But she steeled herself against both... and clasped his fingers firmly. 

He looked at her in some surprise, then smiled, ever so slightly, and drew her ahead of him up the moving stairs. 

She'd never been in Dumbledore's office before, but Harry had described it, so she knew what to expect. The portraits of the Headmasters past, she noticed with some concern, were all awake, despite the late hour, and regarding her with worried expressions. 

So, of course, was the current Headmaster, who smiled at her kindly and rose to his feet as she entered. "Hermione," he said gently. "Severus told me... what happened." 

She couldn't forbear a glance in Snape's direction; his face was expressionless, though not--- quite--- cold. 

Dumbledore waved her into a seat before the fire. "Sit, child, and---" a flicker of his wand; she hadn't noticed until now that he was holding it, and a tray with three steaming mugs of hot chocolate appeared--- "have some of this." 

She wrapped numb fingers around one of the mugs and sat; it was only then that she realized she was still clutching Snape's cloak about her, like a child with a favorite blanket. She blushed and ducked her head; when she raised her eyes, however, Dumbledore winked at her, kindly. 

"It's all right, Hermione," said the Headmaster, then, with a glance at Snape, added, "I don't think Severus will mind if you hold onto his cloak for a bit longer." 

Involuntarily, she glanced at Snape; he shook his head slightly, and lapsed into a chair in the shadow of the fireplace, his face hidden in the drakness. She stared at the long fine hands resting on the arms of the chair--- the only part of him visible--- fascinated and repelled by her own memories. "It's fine," came the silky voice out of the darkness. 

She thought she saw Dumbledore start at the sound of Snape's voice, but she couldn't be sure; by the time she'd got her face around to look at him, his expression was once again firm and kindly. 

"Hermione," he said, bringing her attention back to him. "I think you had better tell us how Lucius Malfoy managed to get hold of you." 

"I'm n-not sure I rem-m-member very much, sir---" she stammered. "I wasn't exactly... th-thinking clearly." 

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Snape shift restlessly in his seat, but Dumbledore spoke first. "Just tell us what you can, then," he said, and leaned back in his chair, regarding her with a kindly gaze. 

Under those friendly twinkling eyes, it seemed easier to speak, and she found the words spilling out of her, at first in a thin trickle, then a gushing torrent, and she found herself recalling little details she hadn't known she'd registered--- the words of the spell; "Third-Party Apparation," Snape muttered under his breath, "the Kidnap Curse,"--- and a host of other little details. Dumbledore listened intently, sometimes asking a question or two that she found helped her to remember rather than disrupting her train of thought. 

"And then he and P-professor Snape came into the room," she said--- and saw Snape shift, saw Dumbledore motion him to silence, and then it was impossible not to let the words out--- "I thought M-mr. Malfoy was going to--- to--- rape me, but Professor S-snape stopped him, and then he sat down next to me... and then there just wasn't anything else there but him," she finished, and let her head droop. 

There was silence in the room for a long moment, after she'd stopped speaking, then Dumbledore spoke. "Severus told me what happened in that room, Hermione," he said gently, "and you needn't relive it again if you don't want to---" 

At the words, her entire body shuddered spasmodically--- because she did want to, God and Merlin both help her--- and she looked up and was suddenly, powerfully and terrifyingly aware of both men, as men, that she was small and powerless and female here in this room, and she had to fight the urge to tuck her knees to her chest and hide in her own body. 

A soft liquid note sounded in the air--- and Fawkes, Professor Dumbledore's phoenix, came to sit on her lap--- an oddly catlike behavior for a bird, she thought, and thought it again when Fawkes rubbed his head against her hand. There was something comforting about Fawkes perched in her lap, and she felt some of the tension in her ease as she stroked his beautiful red-gold feathers. 

A thought occurred to her, and she managed to get it out around the nervous lump in her throat. "Professor Dumbledore, sir--- what about my parents? They expected me home---" 

"Lucius took care of that," Professor Snape said harshly. "At least, he told me that he did---" He looked to Dumbledore for confirmation. 

The Headmaster nodded. "Yes--- they've been informed that you were detained unavoidably and for an unspecified length of time." His eyes were very kind on hers. "So, Hermione, it's up to you--- would you like to go home for the holidays? I can arrange transportation?" 

For a moment, the thought of being safely at home with her parents sounded like a promise of paradise, and she opened her mouth to say yes--- 

Then snapped it shut again. To spent the entire holiday acting normal, as if nothing had ever happened--- she hadn't told her parents about Voldemort, about any of the adventures she'd had, from finding the Philosopher's Stone to being Petrified by a basilisk to catching Rita Skeeter in her Animagus form. She'd promised herself that she'd tell them--- after she graduated, when they wouldn't yank her home. Her parents had had some excitement in their lives--- her mother's exploits at university had been her favorite bedtime stories when she was a child--- but nothing like this. Not to mention the fact that she was safer here, under Dumbledore's protection, than she ever could be at home. 

And if she went home--- her eyes strayed to Snape, of their own accord and against her will--- she wouldn't see him until after the holidays. The memory of that cold empty feeling when he'd left her downstairs echoed in her mind. 

"I--- I'd like to stay," she said, pulling her eyes back to Dumbledore. 

The Headmaster's expression was very gentle and understanding. "All right, Hermione." 

Again, silence, then Professor Snape said, in a voice as kind as she'd ever heard him use, "Perhaps it's time for Miss Granger to go back to the girls' dormitory---" 

And she felt her body go limp, because he'd said just the right words--- she didn't know what she'd have done if he'd said "bed" or anything else, but with that little turn of phrase he'd subtly put a privacy wall between them, respecting her modesty even if she had none left after tonight. 

Except that she quite suddenly didn't want that space, didn't want to be alone in the darkness without his voice and his hands between her and the memory of Lucius Malfoy's lewd sneering face. Her head came up of its own accord and she opened her mouth, not knowing what she'd say--- 

"Not just yet, I think, Severus," Dumbledore said before she could stammer out a comment. "There are still a few more matters we need to discuss--- after which I will leave Miss Granger in your--- care." 

She realized with a start that the Headmaster had almost said hands which was funny... except that it wasn't. Sort of morbid humor, like a Canary Cream that turned you into a cockatrice. 

Snape subsided back into his chair. "Very well." 

Dumbledore turned back to her. "Are you aware of the... subterfuge which Professor Snape employed to prevent Malfoy from assaulting you?" 

The power of pleasure. Snape's silky, caressing voice flowed over her and inside her, and for a moment, she couldn't breathe. "I--- don't know," she said finally. 

Silence again, then Snape said, very gently and quietly, "To put it baldly, child, I convinced him that you were more use to us as a pawn---" though she wasn't looking at him, she could feel his lip curl--- "a love-slave, if you will." 

She raised her head and stared into the shadows that surrounded him, not certain she understood. "I convinced him that I could... condition... you to be the perfect tool for Voldemort's supporters. That, with time, you'd do whatever I ordered you if offered the proper... reward." 

"I think that deserves a little reward, hmm?" Again, his voice came back to her, and the memory of that "reward", and she shuddered convulsively with remembered pleasure and want. 

She forced her body back under the control of her mind, forced herself to look straight at him. "Can you?" 

The bald question caused Snape to sit up straight in his chair; Dumbledore, she noted, was regarding her with some interest. 

"I thought so, earlier," Snape replied after a long pause. "But now I begin to suspect that controlling your mind would be beyond the capacity of any mortal man." His tone was dry, sardonic... and wholly approving. 

And, she thought, wholly undeserved. Because right now, she rather thought she'd betray everything she held dear just for another caress from those hands. 

Dumbledore cleared his throat, gently, and both of them--- no mistaking it--- jumped. "I think," he said quietly, "that we have an opportunity here---" he looked from one to the other, slowly and steadily--- "the details of which I leave it to the two of you to determine." 

Hermione stared at him, not understanding. He looked back at her, met her eyes. "Hermione," he said gently, "tonight you have shown a courage that Godric Gryffindor himself would envy. And above all other things--- remember that there is nothing to be ashamed of in your feelings." He paused, shot an inscrutable glance at Snape, then got to his feet. "Severus?" 

Snape seemed limp, sitting in the corner in the dark, but he drew himself to his feet. "Very well," he said faintly. 

"In that case," Dumbledore said, some of the twinkle back in eyes that were mostly shadowed, "my eyelids await their nightly inspection--- so I'll leave you to it, then." And he swept off, into the darkness that shrouded the rest of the room. 

Hermione stared after him, feeling rather adrift. She'd more than half expected Dumbledore to, well, wave that wand of his and fix it. 

Fix the strange shameful longing she got in her bones when she heard Professor Snape's voice or thought about it. Take away the horrible memories of Lucius Malfoy and the wonderful and terrible ones of Snape. Let her go back to being... happy. 

Snape sighed softly and stepped out of the darkness, drawing her attention back to him at once. He came to stand by her chair. 

"I will confess," he said in a low despairing voice, "that I had hoped that Dumbledore would have... a more definite remedy for the injuries I've done you." He sighed again. "But it seems that that is to be my task...." He looked down at her, deep into her eyes. "If, that is, you can stand to... put your trust in me?" 

She met that gaze, the eyes which were no longer cold hollows but pools of warm aching remorse. "Yes." 

He held out his hand to her. "Come, then." 

She stared at the long thin fingers... then for the second time tonight, wrapped her own about them. 

He looked at her in solemn silence for a moment, then drew her to her feet, and they left Dumbledore's office together.   
  


*****   
  
  
  


From the shadows, hidden by darkness and a well-timed Invisibility Charm, Albus Dumbledore watched as the ill-assorted pair departed his office. 

Have I done the right thing? He could not escape the questions of his conscience, any more than poor Severus could. 

And, like Severus, he could find no other answer. There were too many variables here, not least of them being Voldemort, and the opportunity to add yet another flourish to their manipulation of his plans. Having him believe that Snape was still loyal--- and capable of creating such a pawn--- was highly useful. 

And there was Hermione to consider. The child had lost her innocence tonight, for all that she hadn't been violated in the usual sense. A chance to reclaim some sense of control over her own destiny, to be of use--- possibly critical use--- in the struggle against Voldemort... that could heal her more thoroughly than "protecting" her--- taking away still more of her control of her life. 

Yes, whatever conventional wisdom might say, the last thing Hermione Granger needed after tonight was to be treated like a child. She wasn't, any longer--- she couldn't go back, only forward, like any chess pawn. And, like any chess pawn, she had the chance to become a queen. 

In fact, despite her shivers and startles, Dumbledore had the feeling that little Hermione Granger was in a better way emotionally than Severus. 

He'd been in a better mood the night after the Triwizard Tournament, when he'd returned from Voldemort's side. Not only had the Dark Lord subjected him to the Cruciatus Curse--- as punishment for his disloyalty--- but, all unknowing, Voldemort had given him a worse punishment still: that night, Snape had seen Peter Pettigrew at the Dark Lord's side--- and learned once and for all that Sirius Black, whatever his crimes against Snape (and Albus was willing to admit that the young man had some cause for grievance there) was innocent of the Potters' deaths. He'd bene in agony--- though it was hard to tell whether he suffered more from the knowledge that he'd almost condemned an innocent man to the Dementors' Kiss, or from learning that Black was innocent. 

But even that paled in comparison to his reaction of tonight. No, Albus had only seen Snape worse than this once: the night he'd come to turn himself in, renouncing the Death Eaters and betraying their secrets. 

In exchange he'd asked... nothing. He'd simply told Dumbledore everything that he knew and then sat waiting for his fate, like a puppet with its strings cut, wholly indifferent. 

Tonight he hadn't hit that state of indifference, thank Merlin; no, he was actively remorseful... and so loathing of himself that it wrenched Albus' heart to think of it. Never mind he'd had no other choice. 

And yet that very agony, that remorse, was the brightest glimmer of hope that Albus had seen in a long time, where Severus was concerned. He'd watched the younger man withdraw into himself, gone to ground like a wounded animal, rebuffing all human contact--- yet, to Albus' eyes, that had seen a great deal of the world and what humans could do to one another, starved for it. Afraid of attachment and needing it and deeply convinced that he didn't deserve it. 

Well, he had no choice--- that formidable sense of honor that had driven him to risk his life opposing a cause to which he had once committed himself in error would not allow him to give young Hermione anything less than whatever she needed. 

And unless Dumbledore was sorely mistaken, it would turn out to be exactly what Severus needed as well. 

Cold calculation, of the moral knife's-edge involved. Any logical, ordered system of ethics would demand the opposite of what Dumbledore was permitting. Yet this situation was anything but normal; exceptions had to be made, based on the needs of those involved. 

He'd once given Harry Potter and Ron Weasley Awards for Special Services to the School for an act that involved breaking nearly every school rule in the book, and risking their lives into the bargain. Yet that act had been for the greater good. He could do no less tonight. 

And with that thought, he headed for his bed... where he knew he would find little rest, no matter how carefully he inspected his eyelids. 


	5. Chapter 4: Pawn's Gambit

  
  


Chapter 4: A Pawn's Gambit   
  


"It's a good thing fewer students than usual stayed for the holidays this year," Snape commented dryly as they walked through the deserted corridors of Hogwarts. "I rather doubt either of us would welcome the rumors that would start if anyone saw _this_---" He tightened his grip on her hand. 

Hermione blushed; she hadn't realized she was still clinging to his fingers. "I'm sorry." 

"No need." They had reached the door to the Potions lab; he started to unlock it, stopped. "Child, if you'd rather go elsewhere---" 

Memories of being in that room, even a day ago, before this night had happened, swept over her, bringing with them a painful sense of longing. She opened her mouth to say yes--- 

And stopped. Where else _could_ they go, for what promised to be a _very_ private conversation? "No," she said. "This will be... fine." 

"Good." He unlocked the door with a murmured spell, pushed it open--- but instead of sweeping in ahead of her (as he would have done only yesterday) he gestured for her to precede him into the room. 

She hesitated, confused--- then realized with a shock, _He's treating me like an adult._ An adult woman, entitled to that courtesy. 

The thought was a heady one, and she preceded him into the chill room feeling better than she had since she'd shown up in Lucius Malfoy's dungeon. 

The contrast between that terrifying room and the familiar Potions "dungeon" made the latter seem almost homey, comforting in its familiarity. But it was a bittersweet comfort: she had, in the last weeks, begun to feel almost... comfortable... with Snape. She felt a pang as she realized that she would never again take for granted the simple exchanges of information and ideas--- narrowly focused, confined to their, to _his,_ research as they had been--- that had characterized her so-called detentions. 

Not when she couldn't hear his voice without feeling her blood turn to a liquid fire that burned away thought and shamed her with its madness. Shamed her not least because this was _Snape,_ and he had no tolerance for weakness, because she didn't dare say what she wanted. 

It was cold here, as usual, and she snugged down into the folds of his cloak for warmth. Behind her, he moved toward the door of his office. "Would you like to---?" he stopped, making a question of it. 

She'd only been in his office once before, to filch the ingredients for a Polyjuice Potion--- and never when he was there. It seemed a much safer place than the classroom, where the contrast of the memories would chase her out of her mind. "Yes." 

He opened the door, and again gestured for her to precede him. This time she did so with rather more confidence. 

Snape's office was spacious enough, certainly more so than, say, Professor Vector's. Maybe that was why he took the dungeon; no one else would want it, so he had more space to himself. 

Not that he seemed to need it; the last time she'd been in here, she hadn't wasted any time looking around, but now she saw that he had nothing in the way of personal effects--- unless you counted the slimy things in jars on the shelves. Which she didn't. There were a couple of chairs beside the cold fireplace, and his desk, and the cupboards with his private stores along the walls. Nothing else; no sign that this was someone's personal space. 

She wasn't sure whether that was sad, or scary. 

Snape waved her into a chair, waited until she was seated--- that odd, adult courtesy again--- before settling behind his desk. 

For a moment, there was an awkward silence; then Snape glanced from her to the cold fireplace, and his lips twitched into something like a smile. "My apologies," he said, drawing out his wand and gesturing a fire into life. "I'm rather used to the cold, myself." 

Which reminded her of something she'd learned a while back about him, and had filed away for future use. "Yes, it _is_ rather colder in Switzerland, isn't it?" 

He started, looking at her with something like that familiar piercing gaze. "How did you---" Abruptly, he sank back into his chair with a little snort. "Of course, your--- friend--- Viktor Krum attended Durmstrang." He raised an eyebrow. "I'd ask what became of that, but such curiosity seems rather tasteless under the circumstances." 

Now they were back on dangerous ground, skirting the edge of... _tonight_. She took a deep breath. "Nothing, actually--- his parents didn't approve of him seeing a _Mudblood._" She spoke the last word dryly. 

For a moment, Snape's eyes on her were warm, like the touch of gentle fingers. "The more fool he, to let anything come between him and---" He broke off abruptly, and she couldn't bring herself to ask him what he'd been going to say. "That's par for the course for Durmstrang, though, child--- the entire school is Slytherin House at its worst." 

She blinked at that bald statement, coming from the Head of Slytherin, not to mention someone who had the ties to Durmstrang that he did. "Why... why didn't you go there--- Viktor told me your mother is Potions Mistress at Durmstrang." 

Snape's lips twitched. "Actually, I nearly did--- but my father, for the first time in my then-nine-year-old memory, put his foot down and insisted on Hogwarts. He was a Ravenclaw himself, and I always think he'd rather hoped I would be---" He broke off. "Not that I imagine you're interested in my nostalgic maunderings," he finished, the trademark sarcasm now directed at himself. 

"No--- it's---" What it was, was _humanizing_, making him less the powerful dark shape in that dungeon who controlled her every breath with the slightest whisper and the touch of his long fingers, or even the teacher she had begun to respect, and more like a _person_. Hearing him talk about his own school days, just _talking_, brought them level with one another, made him a person she could safely want.... 

Because she did want him. Never mind that it was shameful and impossible and that he'd have every reason to rebuff any advance she made, and that the whole situation was madness. That if she had any dignity she'd hate the thought of that touch--- though it would be beneath that same dignity to hate _him_: he'd only been trying to save her life, after all! 

None of that stopped her, though, from reacting to his every breath and the slightest twitch of those fingers with an abject and terrifying... _want._

"It's fine," she managed--- then added, strike of sardonic inspiration--- "I've been rather _exposed_ to you tonight, it's only fair that I get to see something of you in return, isn't it?" 

For a second, his eyes were nothing but startled; then he smiled--- a real smile, warm with approval and even respect. "I suppose it is, at that," he admitted wryly, "though why you'd want to is beyond _me_---" 

He broke off, and in the silence, she wondered, staring at the dark shadowed eyes, how anyone could hate himself so very much. 

She opened her mouth to ask--- on this strange and twisted night, it seemed nothing was out of bounds--- but he spoke before she could. "Child," he said gently, "I cannot help but say it again--- I am so very sorry for the harm I have done you, so sorry that your first experience of--- a man--- had to be _this_---" 

She wasn't sure if he meant the horror of tonight... or the simple fact of his own ugliness. Stricken by the disgust in his voice, she said the first words that came to mind. "Better you than Lucius Malfoy any day." 

Again he looked startled... then chuckled softly. "There is that, I suppose." He sobered. "Child, you needn't be brave here; you've more than earned the right to ask anything you want of me." 

_Touch me again._ The words formed themselves in her mind before she could think. 

But did she really want that? Could she, when hard on the heels of any thought of his wonderful hands came the image of Lucius Malfoy's leering face? Could she ever let herself feel... anything... again? 

She began to shake, uncontrollably, and fought--- again--- the urge to curl into a ball and huddle. Yet it was too much to sit there staring at him; she leapt to her feet and went to stand by the fireplace, shivering, trying to pretend that it was it was only the cold. 

And it was, in a sense, but it wasn't a cold the fire could warm. 

Only his hands could do that. 

She leaned against the side of the fireplace--- it was huge, the mantle well above her head--- and tried to collect herself. 

For a moment, there was silence behind her--- then she heard a rustle, and started, but forced herself not to move, not to glance fearfully over her shoulder like a terrified child. 

Soft but audible footsteps--- she was grateful for the sound; she knew from experience that he could move silently as a cat when he chose--- sounded behind her, stopped a few feet away. After a carefully controlled moment, she looked up, to see him regarding her from the other side of the hearth. 

"Child--- Hermione---" His voice was very gentle, infinitely remorseful. He took a slow gliding step forward--- how had she never noticed the sheer _sensuality_ in the smoothness of his stride?--- and, standing at arm's length, reached out and cupped her cheek in his hand. 

For a moment, he stroked her face, with a firm, kind touch that was the other side, the safe side, of what had happened in that other dungeon. "Is this too terrible?" he asked softly, his eyes full of concern. 

It wasn't terrible at all, and that was what was terrible, but she didn't know how to say that, couldn't say rationally the words that had come out of her mouth under the spell of his caress, and so she only shook her head, not trusting herself to speak. "That's something, then," he sighed, and kept petting her, just that gentle smooth pressure of his hand against her face, from jawline to hair, drawing her tangled mop of curls back from her face. 

She leaned into the touch, which was a different thing altogether from the excruciatingly pleasurable caresses she'd just had of him. Different... yet it sparked the same warm tingle inside her. 

"Yes," he said softly, as if reading her thoughts. "It's not always horrible, child." And then in a whisper, "I'm not such a monster I can only abuse with these hands---" 

And she wasn't sure if it was the pain and remorse and the terrible, terrible self-loathing in his tone that made her do it--- or the ache in her body, the helpless craving that drew her to him like iron to a magnet--- but the next thing she knew, she had crossed the distance between them and buried herself in his arms. 

He started violently, stiffened and jerked like he'd been struck as her arms went round his waist--- then, before she could respond to what felt like a rejection, he'd put his arms gently about her, folding her into a warm, sheltering embrace. 

For a moment, she thought of that other dungeon, and his arms felt like a trap, imprisoning her. She brought her hands around to his chest, to push away--- 

Immediately, the arms holding her loosened, and he drew back, his reflexes far faster than hers had been. "Child," he said gently, "you have my word: I shall take no liberties with you--- do nothing, nothing at all, to you without your permission." A soft sound, something that perhaps wanted to be a chuckle if it hadn't been so sad. "Do with me as you will." 

The macabre humor of it was enough to force a laugh out of her, and she relaxed then against his chest, resting her hands against his heartbeat and her cheek against her hands. His arms slid gently around her, cradling rather than prisoning; she remembered that his hands, too, had made her feel safe.... 

But here there was only safety, and shelter, and kindness; the residual half-terrified and half-delighted thrill of being so close to him was melting down, warm embers in the wake of lightning. She could lean her head on his chest and revel in the warmth and safety and there was no shame in it, no loss of control over herself, just this safe kindness. 

She relaxed a little against him, breathing in the scent of his skin. Not a scent you'd expect from a man with greasy hair and yellowed teeth: the predominant component was strong soap, the same kind they used to clean their Potions equipment. But there were traces of the herbs and other components they used in Potions, and under it something musky and strong that left itself in the back of her throat and reminded her of the silky throb in his voice when he'd caressed her with words in the darkness--- 

She began to shiver again, and her lips pulled back into a sob--- ultimate humiliation, to cry like a child along with everything else, and she tried to pull away from him, to hide--- 

His arms were very gentle about her, and he bent and whispered softly, "There's nothing to be ashamed of, child--- nothing at all. It's good for you to cry, as much as you need---" 

And as if those words were a trigger, she found that she could no longer hold back the wracking sobs, and soon she was keening hysterically, rocking back and forth against him with her hands kneading the folds of his robes convulsively. 

She found that her knees wouldn't hold her, and she expected that he'd lead her to a chair--- but instead, he drew her close against him and moved them to the hearth. He drew her down with him so that he sat on the hearthstones and she cuddled in his lap, curled up in a ball like she'd wanted to do for what seemed like forever. He gathered her up and wrapped his arms around her and rocked her against him, his chin resting on her head, his voice--- not that silky whisper, but equally soft--- murmuring to her. "It's all right, child, let it go... let it go...." 

And she did, just let herself cry with her face buried in his shoulder. After a little while, he fell silent, just holding her and rocking her, one hand combing her hair in a soothing rhythm. 

Gradually, the sobs stopped trying to tear their way out of her, and after a time, she was able to relax in his embrace and listen to his heartbeat and the quite crackle of the fire. 

Slowly the realization swept over her, so obvious and yet so automatic that it startled her. 

_She was no longer afraid._ Not that his touch didn't send strange thrills through her body, but it was controllable now, not that helpless longing. And the memories of Lucius Malfoy leering down at her still made her shake... but she could be this close to Snape and not tremble. 

It was something. More than she'd expected to have for a very long time after this. And she wormed her way deeper into his embrace, cuddled up to him--- just because she could. 

She felt him sigh deep in his chest; then his chin came to rest on her head. And for a long time, they simply curled by the fire in peace. 

Finally, though, he drew a deep breath. "There's something I'd like to show you, if you're interested," he said, his voice muffled slightly against her hair. "Something that might put tonight's events in a little more perspective for you?" 

His voice sounded almost plaintive--- and she was curious; she was _always_ curious. She'd have wondered about her sanity if she weren't. "Yes," she said, leaning back a little to look up at him. 

"All right, then," he said, and unwound himself from about her. "Up you get." There was something so--- light--- about his tone and the words that she felt a little lighter inside, herself. She disentangled herself from his arms and let him lift her to her feet as he stood himself. 

He kept one arm loosely about her shoulders--- not a lover's gesture; more the way a professor might touch a student he was fond of. Professor Vector sometimes put her arm on Hermione's shoulders that way; the comparison was rather reassuring. "Over here," he said, and guided her to a darkened corner of the room. 

She couldn't see for the shadows, but he drew his wand out of some hidden pocket. "_Lumos_." 

She'd expected the wand itself to light--- that was what that spell usually did--- but instead, several small globes hanging from the ceiling flickered into life, revealing two chairs on either side of a small table, on which stood--- a chess set. 

"It was my mother's," Snape said into her puzzled silence. "She gave it to me when I graduated from Hogwarts." He stepped past her to the table, turned to face her, the warm dim light throwing an odd play of shadows across his face. "Do you play?" 

"N-not well," she managed, surprised, thinking that if Ron always beat her, then Snape would wipe the board with her. But she sat down gamely. 

Snape perhaps sensed something of her thoughts, for he smiled dryly across the table at her. "I'm not asking for a game," he said, "unless you'd like to play--- though I misdoubt either of us is up to the challenge tonight." He dropped into the seat across from her. "No--- I only asked because I wanted to know if you understood the game." 

She had the feeling there was more to it than that. "You mean the one on the board, or the one you're playing?" 

He regarded her with some surprise--- then a smile flickered over those saturnine features, taking ten years off his age in the dim light. "Very good," he said gently, "very good indeed." He sat forward, leaning over the board. "Actually, they have a great deal in common." 

He gestured to the pieces in front of them; some of the pieces looked back. "Offhand, child, which piece on a chessboard would you say is the most powerful?" 

"The queen," she replied without hesitation. "It---" Both the black and the white queens turned to look at her with identical expressions of disgust on their perfectly chiseled little faces, and she hastily amended, "I mean, _she_ has free range of motion." 

Snape nodded. "And which would you say had the least?" 

"The pawns." Again, an easy answer. 

"Very good,' he said softly. "Now, child, look at this chessboard--- at the pieces--- and tell me what you see." 

She did as he bade her, dropping her head down to the table and resting her chin on her hands to be at eye level with the board. It was on a turntable, and, after a glance at Snape for permission, she turned it ninety degrees to get a look at both sides. 

You didn't often see a whole wizard chess set--- most people had a set of pieces that they played as either color, since the chess pieces responded best if they knew and trusted you. This was an old set, and no mistake; the pieces, as sometimes happened with wizard chess sets, had acquired a distinct life and personality of their own. Several of them left their places and came over to the edge of the board to return her gaze impudently. 

One of the pawns sat on the edge of the board, cross-legged, returning her gaze with frank interest. Hermione stared back blankly at the pawn--- then looked closer--- 

She sat up abruptly. "They're girls!" She picked up one of the pawns, ignoring its--- _her_--- startled squeak. "They're all girls!" 

Snape smiled. "Precisely." He touched one of the girl-pawns on the head, and she turned to look at him. "This set was given to my mother as a wedding gift, by one of our cousins---" his lip twisted wryly--- "it requires a degree in genealogy to sort out the tangled familial relationships among purebloods, child; most Slytherins make a hobby of it, at least while they're on the marriage market---" his eyes darkened, and she winced away from the thought of what he would have gone through as a young man expected to make a good marriage. "At any rate, it represents one of the traditions on _both_ sides of my family that I think will meet with your approval---" the glitter in his eyes bordered on a twinkle--- "a certain high regard for strong women." 

There were any number of ways to take that statement--- she shied away from the more personal, and settled for the most literal. "But why pawns, if it's a feminist chess set?" she asked. 

He clucked his tongue at her; only the glitter of humor in his eyes kept it from being a scold. "That's why I asked if you played chess, child," he chided. "Think--- what can the pawn do that no other piece can?" 

She stared at the board for a minute, thinking hard--- looking at the little girl pawns, and the other pieces, the stolid rooks, the knights on their prancing horses, the careworn and rather nervous-looking kings, and the proud queens--- 

And understood. "It can become a queen." 

His dry, approving smile reminded her of the more pleasant moments they'd spent in the lab during her detentions. "Precisely." With a little wave of his hand, he urged a black rook and its attendant pawn out of the way, then directed a white pawn, step by single-square step, across the board. 

At the eighth square, it paused and shimmered, growing taller and filling out, until there were three queens on the board. 

Snape looked across at her. "Of course, the pawn's journey isn't that simple---" another wave of his hand and the pieces resumed their starting positions, the new queen dwindling back down to her pawn-self as she returned to her starting square. "It's usually more like--- let me think--- ah--- like _this---_" another gesture, and the pieces began to move. 

She'd seen piece-games played out like this before; chess sets remembered every game they'd ever played, and you could get them to replicate a game as long as you had two sets that had played the same one. Since the black and white came together in this set, they knew all the same games. 

Hermione could tell at a glance that it was a much more sophisticated game than the ones that usually happened in the Gryffindor common room. The pieces moved in complicated patterns, a stately, savage dance. 

She watched in fascination as one by one, the pieces fell. And it took no great observational skill to note that the pawns were the hardest hit. The little ones zigzagged across the board, occasionally taking pieces, more often getting taken as they made their slow painful way across the board to the eighth row. 

Finally, it was down to only a few pieces: the kings, black's queen, one white bishop, and a scattering of others, mostly black. 

And, in the back row, one little white pawn, on the seventh square. 

The pawn stepped forward, and became a queen. 

Hermione looked up at Snape, who was watching her with shadowed eyes. "A pawn," he repeated, "can become a queen--- if she can survive." 

For a moment, she didn't understand... then it hit her, and she sat up straight, staring unseeing at the board because she couldn't meet his eyes. 

_The perfect pawn._ His silky voice, coaxing and taunting Lucius Malfoy, came back to her in a memory she didn't realize she had. She looked up at him, unable to believe what she was hearing. 

"It's a dangerous trip across the board," he said, and she knew that they had left the literal and entered the realm of metaphor, "and we're a dreadfully long way from the eighth square." His dark eyes captured hers, and there was nothing of humor or gentleness about them, only a deadly earnestness. "There's no shame in stepping out of play before you're taken." 

She closed her eyes for a moment. He was offering her a choice: to be safe, to avoid another nightmare like what had happened tonight--- 

For a minute, the thought of safety was wildly tempting. To put Lucius Malfoy's dungeon behind her as just an isolated, terrifying memory and try to get on with her life--- 

But could she? Rational thought intruded. The game that they were playing was for no lesser stakes than the life and freedom of everyone they cared about--- and the black king was no one less than the most powerful Dark wizard in a hundred years. 

If one little pawn could creep its way across the board and turn the tables with a queen's power, it had to be risked. 

_A queen's power._ She gasped as the implications came to her. If she could reach the eighth square, she'd never have a pawn's fears again. She could take her life back--- recover from those moments of helpless fear and even more powerless surrender she'd known in Malfoy's dungeon. She could control her own destiny. 

She opened her eyes and looked up at him. "I'm a Gryffindor, aren't I?" she asked. "And we're supposed to be brave." 

She reached out and tapped the new white queen (the pieces had paused once they took their attention off the board). The queen looked up at her, nodded--- and made straight for a black knight threatening her king. She dragged him off his horse and sent him flying, then glared imperiously around the board. 

Snape smiled dryly--- but there were shadows in his dark eyes. "It's not an easy path, child, nor will it likely be a pleasant one." His lip twisted. "You may sometimes wish you were back in that dungeon." 

A flash of memory washed over her--- his hands, caressing her intimately, melting her bones with pleasure--- and it was only with an effort that she suppressed a hungry tremor. "What's involved?" she asked, proud of the steadiness of her voice. 

Snape took a deep breath, steepling his fingers and leaning back, out of the light, so that only his glittering eyes were visible in the shadows. "If you think that I've been a stern taskmaster before this," he said, "you'll consider me an absolute monster before we're done." 

The possible meanings of that comment made her shiver, and he muttered something under his breath, sitting forward sharply. "No, child, I did not mean _that!_" He reached out a hand to her, and she let his warm fingers rest over her arm for a moment, feeling the wash of pleasure that was far less guilty than it had been a few hours ago. 

He sat back and regarded her somberly. "Though I will not lie to you--- it may be necessary for me to--- evoke certain responses in you from time to time, as part of our deception. After all, you must seem to _be_ in truth my pawn---" his lip curled, and he flexed his fingers, looking at them in disgust--- "a slave to what my hands can do to you---" 

The memory hit her again, and she shivered. That wasn't so far from the truth; she was awfully glad that they were on the same side.... 

He looked up at her, seriously. "Though I swear to you, child, that if I have any power at all, I will _never_--- place you on display before the likes of Lucius Malfoy again." 

She stared at him: he wore an expression of loathing that she'd only seem him direct at Harry and Professor Lupin. Somehow, it warmed her heart to think that he could despise someone that _she_ also hated. 

"Yes, child," he said softly into her surprised and gratified silence. "I despise Malfoy--- and his maggot of a son--- as much as you. Perhaps more--- I've seen more of what that slime is capable of---" He broke off, biting his lip, looking away, his expression bleak and haunted. 

She decided that she really didn't want to know what Malfoy could do--- not if tonight was only a small example. "But---" she ventured timidly, "if you hate him so much then why--- in class you always---" 

He looked back at her, the smile on his face unpleasantly familiar to a Gryffindor who'd sat through six years of Potions classes with him as her professor. "All part of the charade, child--- wouldn't a loyal Death Eater naturally favor the spawn of his old cohorts?" His eyes glittered darkly. "Besides, what better way to handicap the next generation of Voldemort's troops than by spoiling them rotten? Accustoming them to getting everything they want--- with none of the discipline and effort that being an effective servant of _either_ side requires?" 

She stared at him in astonishment--- and the other side of that equation came to her. "And you teach the rest of us--- you're so hard on us, _because_ we need to be prepared---" 

"Precisely." His lip twisted. "If you lot can't survive _me_, you've no chance against Voldemort." 

She almost smiled at that--- then a thought occurred to her. "But--- are _all_ the Slytherins just... what you said, 'the next generation of Voldemort's troops'? I mean, the whole House can't be--- or can it?" Her head was spinning. This was one too many revelations for a night of horror. 

Snape smiled. "Very good--- you haven't let Gryffindor prejudice get in the way of sense." For just a second, that smile twisted into something dark and despairing, and he looked away from her, into the darkness--- then he turned back, and his expression was wry, cynical, but no longer haunted. "There are a few decent students in Slytherin--- just as the other Houses have a few of the other sort in their midst." He raised an eyebrow at her, steepled his fingers on the table between them. "And how do _you_ think I should treat them?" 

She blinked at the unexpected question--- then looked down at the chessboard: maybe this was the beginning of the pawn's journey. "Well, you can't very well treat them any differently from the rest of the House, can you? That would only set them apart more--- and you don't want the best of the lot getting put on, it'd only drive them to be like the nasty ones...?" She looked hesitantly across the table at him; the glitter in his eyes was guardedly approving, and she went on. "I suppose you'd have to be a little rough on them, though, wouldn't you--- don't want to spoil them like the others, _and_ it probably keeps their housemates off them a little, if you're not favoring them." 

His thin lips stretched into a wholly approving smile, and she felt a warm glow flow over her. "Very good, child--- right in one." He paused for a second, looking about to say something more, then fell silent for a moment. When he spoke, it was in a completely different tone, his usual dry one. "As you've probably surmised---" he waved at the chessboard--- "that little test of your analytical skills was a part of our... pawn's gambit, shall we call it." He picked up one of the white pawns, his long fingers playing over its shape in a way that Hermione could not help but find... seductive. "A part," he said, looking at her across the board, "but only a small one." 

She swallowed hard, having trouble keeping her eyes on his; they kept wanting to wander back to that pawn turning over and over in his long deft hands.... "What's the rest of it?" 

He smiled darkly, sat forward and settled the pawn on the table between them. "To be honest with you, I don't know--- at least not all of it---" he made a gesture at the board, and the pieces resumed their original places, black facing white across the board. "You see, the game is barely begun--- we could move in so many directions...." He trailed off, staring moodily at the board, lost in thought, apparently; she kept silent, respecting his musing. 

"One thing I can tell you---" His voice broke the silence suddenly, startling her--- "is that it will involve another set of lessons---" 

She started slightly, her mind going back to that little dungeon room and the thought of the kind of things he could teach her--- 

He didn't appear to notice, for he gave a dry laugh. "You should be pleased, child--- you'll be getting instruction in the Dark Arts from a former Death Eater--- the best teacher possible for such an apt pupil." 

She blinked, the terrifying and exciting fantasies shredding like gossamer cloth under strong hands. "The--- the Dark Arts?" she repeated, confused. 

"Yes---" his voice had something of the old impatience in it--- "unlike the pawn, child, you won't magically transfigure into a powerful queen at the moment of truth--- you'll need some advance preparation." Chill look in his dark and glittering eyes, mesmerizing her. "And sometimes, the best way to fight fire is with fire." 

"You mean... I'll be... I'll have to fight... Death Eaters?" 

That impatient expression was back. "Yes, of course--- what did you expect?" His voice was the old familiar whipcrack--- but it was unexpected after the kindness he'd shown her tonight, and she felt her eyes fill with tears. She closed them, trying to hide the pain from him, feeling a fresh surge of shame at her own weakness. 

"Child---" he muttered something she couldn't hear; his chair scraped on the floor, and a second later, she felt his warmth next to her. "Hermione--- look at me." 

Reluctantly, she opened her eyes, to find him kneeling beside her chair. As in the anteroom to the Headmaster's office, he'd managed to arrange himself so that his head was a little below hers, and the sight of him looking up at her was strangely calming. 

He took her face in his hands, gently, his fingers splayed along her skull, the thumbs just brushing her temples. "Hermione," he said earnestly, looking into her eyes, "_this is part of the gambit._" 

She stared into his dark eyes, glittering intensely--- and it was the same look he'd given her in Malfoy's dungeon, that apologized and pleaded at once. She nodded slightly, and he released her. 

"Do you understand?" he asked softly, one hand coming up to stroke her hair, tangling gently in the curls. "Do you see why I have to do this? Why you need it?" 

She looked away for a moment, wanting to allow herself the hurt, the weakness of it... but her own words mocked her. "_You're so hard on us, because we need to be prepared...."_

And the worst he would do was--- again--- better than what Malfoy and his cohorts could dream up. 

She swallowed hard, looking back up at him. "Yes," she said at last. 

"Good." He drew back a little. "I did warn you, after all, that you'd find me a cruel taskmaster---" his lip twisted--- "Even more so than usual, that is." 

She nodded slightly. "I--- know. But--- this is the best option, isn't it?" Flash of insight--- she must be feeling more brilliant than usual, maybe it was something to do with her brain making up for her earlier helplessness--- "Like what you did in M-mr. Malfoy's dungeon?" 

For a moment he stared at her, his eyes widening slightly, his lips parting in surprise. Then he closed his eyes for a moment, drew a long breath, as if a great weight had been removed from his shoulders. When he opened his eyes again, they were warm and almost painfully grateful on hers. 

"I wasn't certain if you would realize that, child," he murmured. "If you could understand the calculation involved--- it's not a question of intellect," he added hastily, seeing the flicker of hurt that must have crossed her face as it did her heart--- "but of experience, of being able to look past your own emotions and analyze a situation despite its personal horror---" 

His eyes flickered away from her face, and he looked, for a second, very hurt and sad and somehow young and vulnerable. Then he looked back at her, and the warmth was back. "Once again, you manage to impress me." 

Again his hand cupped her head, this time with a gentle pressure on the back of her skull that invited her to lean close... if she wanted. "Come here?" Again, invitation rather than command. 

It seemed like a very natural thing to do, and there was nothing of either threat or promise in his voice or manner, and so she leaned forward as he rose up on his knees and drew her head to his shoulder. 

She felt his cheek rub against the side of her head, the warmth of his breath stirring her hair as his fingers combed through the tight curls. "It won't be all harshness, child," he said softly against her hair. Then, with a faint echo of bitterness, "it can't be, can it?" 

She remembered what he'd said about "evoking certain responses," and her body gave a little shiver of pleasurable panic, but she was just too tired, too worn out after the nightmare night she'd had and the emotional roller coaster she'd ridden, to care. It was simply too pleasant to lean against him, with his arm gently around her and her face in his neck, breathing in the scent of his skin and feeling, for the moment at least, very safe and cared for. 

After a moment, though, he let her go, pushing her back just a little. She sat up, reluctantly, and caught her breath, wondering what would happen next. 

For a moment, he simply stroked her hair, cradling her face against his palm, his expression inscrutable. Then, with a slight sigh, he met her eyes again. "It would be an understatement approaching absurdity, not to mention a cruelty beyond even my capacity, to say that you've had a long night." She had to smother a giggle at that remark. He rose gracefully to his feet, his hand falling to his side amid the folds of his robes. "So child, I'd advise that you get yourself back to your dormitory--- by way of the kitchens; the house elves will be happy to fetch you a small feast---" 

Hermione flinched at the mention of house-elves; she'd never gotten over the sense that the poor things were badly maltreated... and tonight of all nights she couldn't help but a feel a certain kinship with them. 

Snape, of course, noticed. "What is it?" he asked, frowning slightly in concern--- then his expression cleared. "More of that 'house-elf rights' nonsense you perpetrated last year?" he asked dryly. "I heard about that---" 

Now she was on more familiar ground, defending an opinion--- one she'd had to defend with all sorts of research for the last year. "It isn't nonsense!" she exclaimed, getting her feet under her and rising to face him. "They're nothing but slaves---" 

Snape seemed quite taken aback by her reaction--- then he smiled slightly, and she braced herself for a condescending remark--- 

Which never came. "A queen in the making," he murmured, more to himself than to her. The slight smile acquired a wry twitch at the corners. "Oh, I'll grant they're rather a sorry lot these days," he said, shrugging slightly, "but did you, Miss Granger, with your vaunted research skills, ever discover exactly where house elves came from--- and more to the point, _what_ they came from?" 

Hermione blinked, startled by the turn the debate had taken. "Well--- no," she admitted. "I found some books about it, but they were in the restricted section---" 

"As well they should be," he said firmly. "Child, to give you an idea of what the ancestors of today's house-elves were like---" His lip twisted. "Well, they weren't nearly as nice as goblins, nor as magically weak as a phoenix." He raised an eyebrow. "Does that give you an idea?" 

Hermione stared at him; somehow, the idea that the poor downtrodden house-elves had once been something that was very likely a terrible menace was almost the worst shock of the night. "I--- er--- oh, dear," she said faintly. 

Snape, perhaps out of kindness, did not press his advantage. "Well, you're a prefect now," he said, "so you can look it up for yourself--- and if you fancy," he added, "I've a few books on the subject that Madam Pince most emphatically does _not._" He smiled at the surprise on her face. "Family heirlooms, child--- some of my father's ancestors were involved--- along with---" his lip twisted--- "a few of the Potter family, if I remember correctly." 

She blinked; the notion of Harry's family working with... Snape's... was just a little much for her. 

But then, as Ron would probably point out, just the notion of Snape _having_ a family ought to be enough to boggle anyone's mind. 

The thought brought a surprising well of defensive anger in her chest... and she realized: Snape was now one of the people she'd take up for. 

This ought to make for an interesting holiday, she thought wearily. She wasn't sure _what_ she'd do if Harry and Ron started griping about their Potions homework--- 

Which reminded her--- "I'm supposed to be at home this holiday," she said, then in a rush, "What should I tell... Harry and Ron?" 

Snape blinked at the abrupt change of subject--- or perhaps not so abrupt, given that they had been discussing family. He opened his mouth--- then snapped it closed, moved back from her and leaned on the table. "What _should_ you tell them?" he asked quietly, folding his arms over his chest and raising one eyebrow. 

Of course--- another part of the pawn's gambit. She thought for a minute. "I think I'd better tell them the truth... just not all of it," she decided. "I'll tell them that... Mr. Malfoy... kidnaped me, and that you talked him out of hurting me and convinced him I could be made to spy on Harry." She looked up at him anxiously. "Is that... right?" 

He regarded her thoughtfully for a moment--- then, abruptly, nodded. "A rather bald narrative--- but I trust you'll provide it with suitable dressing before you take it out in public?" She nodded, and he continued. "As little as I like the notion of telling Potter anything, I fear he needs to know... if only so that he'll play along; he's got that much sense, I trust---" He bit his lip. "More than his father, I hope for your sake." 

The look on his face was sufficiently bleak as to make her startle, but before she could react, his expression cleared. "In any event," he said, "you'll need your wits about you for _that_ discussion--- so I suggest you take yourself off to your dormitory--- by way of the kitchen, if---" his lip twisted--- "you can manage to eat anything." 

An hour ago, she would have considered the thought a nauseating one, but suddenly she was ravenous--- her body overcoming the shock she'd had, she decided, and thought that drugging herself with caloric overload--- just this once--- was a Very Good Idea. "All right." 

But she didn't move. 

For a moment, they stared at each other. It had just occurred to her that leaving and being out of his presence were the same thing, and she realized suddenly that she very much didn't want that. "P-professor Snape?" It was hard to say his name somehow. 

He flinched, and she realized with a shock that felt very like lightning that it was the very words she'd used in the dungeon--- but what else _could_ she call him? 

After a moment, he seemed to recover, and he smiled slightly, wryly. "You might call me Severus, child, when we're alone---" 

Now it was her turn to twitch, at the unexpected intimacy and what it might portend. 

He noticed. "Or---" he said dryly, "not, if you prefer---" 

There was something under the sarcasm, something that spoke of pain... and rejection. "Severus," she blurted, inspired more by that hurt than by anything rational. 

He twitched, but it wasn't the same sort of thing as the flinch, she thought--- and knew it when he smiled. "Yes, child?" The smile acquired its usual sardonic glint. "You _were_ about to ask me something, I believe?" 

"I---" Now that she thought about it, what she wanted to ask was at least as intimate-sounding as calling him by his given name. "Do--- when should I come back here?" 

He looked startled for a moment, then recovered himself. "When would you like to?" Soft voice--- tense, as if it wanted to be that silky caress and wasn't allowed. 

Tomorrow, was her first thought. She shivered. "I--- how soon would be safe?" 

His lips twitched wryly. "I rather think that depends on your _friends_---" his voice made the word a slight insult--- "and what they're likely to think of your visiting me---" he got a faraway, calculating sort of expression on his face, that left as soon as it arrived. "That's up to you, child," he said, his tone brisk without losing its gentleness--- then, dryly, "I'll certainly be here, if you wish to find me." 

Again that hint of hurt in his voice, and she thought with a pang, _He hasn't anywhere else to go._ "I--- I'll do that." 

He nodded slightly. For an awkward moment, they stood together, neither one moving, then he said, "You'd best be gone, then, child." 

She swallowed hard against a tight knot in her throat--- a knot that had something to do with being alone in cold, dark hallways and her little room. After a moment, she got herself under control--- a queen shouldn't be scared, she chided herself, and nodded, trying to make it firm. "All right." 

"I'll see you out--- I want to lock up." He ushered her out through the lab to the corridor, his hand not quite resting on her back. At the door, she turned back to him before he could open it. 

"Th-thank you," she said, not sure how grateful she actually felt, but knowing that she ought to be. 

His lip twisted, but the sardonic expression seemed to be more for himself than for her. "Don't," he told her gently. 

She lingered there for a moment, looking into his eyes, torn between a desire to leave with any haste dignity would allow, and to cling to him with all her strength. 

He solved the dilemma for her. "Good night, child." There was just the barest hint of command about it, and she obeyed without thinking--- much. 

"Good night--- Severus." She turned the knob and went out in the hall. 

Behind her, she thought she heard his voice, very soft, whisper her name. "_Hermione."_

But when she turned around, the door was closed. 


	6. Chapter 5: A Bishop Alone

  
  


Chapter 5: A Bishop Alone   
  


Snape closed the door behind Hermione Granger with a mixture of relief and regret. "Cherished---" The word slipped from his mouth before he could bite it back as he'd done all evening. 

In the next second, he cursed himself roundly for his weakness, his craven longings. _She's a child, for Merlin's sake--- just a child. _

Except that she wasn't, exactly, not in body--- certainly not in intellect--- and not even by law. 

And he'd been alone for so very long.... 

He pressed the heels of his hands against his eyes, fighting the ache in his skull, and dragged himself toward his office. He'd a few sleeping potions locked in the bottom drawer of his desk, against nights like this--- 

No, not "like this". He'd never had a night "like this" in his life. Not even that dreadful night when the realization of what the Death Eaters truly were--- what _he_ was--- had come crashing down on him had been so terrible. _That _night, he'd merely been horrified, sickened at what he'd become, what he'd allowed himself to be part of... but he had at least been horrified, and nothing else. Tonight... tonight, despite the violent roiling of his stomach, despite the self-loathing chewing a hole in his vitals... his blood still burned at the memory of _her_ under his hands, all soft yielding flesh and delighted whimpering.... 

_I'm sorry, Hermione._ Sorry, not only for what he'd done, but for enjoying it. For--- Merlin help him--- wanting so much to do it again.... 

He opened his eyes at the door to his office, leaning on the doorjamb, sweeping a glance around the room. Everything somehow seemed different--- though perhaps (he hoped vainly) it was merely the unaccustomed warm glow of the fire and the lamps around the chess table. 

Too warm in here, really, and too bright by half. A flick of his wand, and the lamp flickered off; another, and the hearth was cold again. 

He started for his desk, wanting nothing more than the Dreamless Sleep Potion he kept there. It was stronger and more effective, for him at least, than the stupid "Sweet Dreams" Potions most people used. Even a potion had to have something to work with, and there was nothing in _his_ subconscious that would produce anything but nightmares. 

Dreamless Sleep Potion--- and a _very_ cold shower. He usually felt the need to bathe after being in Lucius Malfoy's presence--- and a Dark Revel was enough to make him want to scour his skin raw in near-boiling water, by way of disinfectant. Tonight, though, offering any sensual pleasure to his sensitized skin was courting danger. He would not--- would _not!_--- violate her innocence any further, even in the privacy of his own thoughts. 

He got the vial out of his desk and started back across the room, when something caught his eye--- his cloak, still draped over the chair where Hermione had sat. He went over and picked it up. 

A few strands of her soft long hair clung to the dark wool, like spun bronze against the black. Gently he disentangled them from the wool--- _evidence_, he told himself, _and safer for her if I take them; give them back to her when she's here next._ Hair could be used in any number of spells and potions, many of them not to the advantage of the one whose hair was so used. 

Carefully, he drew the strands one by one out of the wool, winding them into a little coil round one finger. They were so curly that they coiled up naturally, reminding him with a pang of the feel of the soft woolly mass of her hair under his hands, the way the little spring-curls had wrapped round his fingers as he combed them. So much like affection.... 

He raised the cloak to his face--- her scent clung to the wool with the soft hairs: tears and sweat and a sweet-sour sharp scent he knew too well, familiar and yet unique, distinctly _hers_. He moaned aloud at the memory of her naked body, all ripe untouched curves and eagerness.... 

And he'd twisted that innocence, hurt and frightened her and made her love it. Merlin's _bones_. 

Never mind that he could name the biochemical reactions that contact had produced in _both_ their bodies--- a comprehensive knowledge of human biochemistry was necessary to a potions maker; how else could one design compounds that would affect the body's complex systems? But the clinical analysis of what had happened between them tonight did nothing to dull his... _appetite._ He'd always been smugly amused by men who allowed those appetites to rule them, reveled sardonically in his own triumph over those feelings. But tonight he was as starved as any of the brutes he'd ever mocked. 

The cloak, impossibly, seemed still warm from her body, reminded him of another memory, more innocent though no less painful: the moment by the hearth when he had opened his arms to her and she had come to him. For a moment he could actually feel her in his arms again: soft warmth cuddling against him with no trace of shame or reluctance--- or desire either; just the simple innocent want of comfort and care. Her light curving weight on his lap, the way she'd burrowed close to him for comfort; the softness and scent of her hair under his cheek and hands. 

He closed his eyes, hearing in his mind the words he'd wanted to say to her, countless little endearments--- _love_, _sweet, treasure---_ and the one that had most frequently come to his lips, bit back and twisted into the more innocent "child"--- _cherished._ He'd had to twist that word, to fight the urge to shower her with tenderness he'd no right to give and she certainly wouldn't want--- _hadn't_ wanted; look at the way she'd flinched when he'd called her "sweet"--- certainly an innocent enough term. She was anything but his lover, and he had to remind himself with every breath that if she was not _literally_ a child, she was certainly an innocent; he had no right to foist his own selfish longings on her--- 

It came to him, then, with a flash of humiliating insight, that he had not wanted her body half so much as he had simply wanted some human contact. 

Wanted a little kindness. Wanted someone to be close to him of their own free will; or at least, not to mind it too much. Shameful, for a man of almost forty, to admit to being as love-starved as a child--- but he was. He couldn't remember the last time he'd touched anyone, or been touched, in any but the most perfunctory manner. 

He sank into the chair by the cold hearth, shaking. That had been the root of his stupid weakness--- the weakness begun not tonight when he'd found her in Malfoy's dungeon, but weeks ago, when he'd had Hermione serve her first detention as his lab assistant. Or perhaps before... what _had_ he begun to feel a certain fondness for the girl? His lip twitched in spite of himself--- it might have been as early as the first day he'd had her in class, when she'd actually got out of her seat in her eagerness to answer a question. If it hadn't been for Potter's very presence setting his teeth on edge, she'd have very likely gotten a smile out of him for that little performance. 

Not that it would likely have mattered to her. Not that his thoughts or feelings mattered to anyone... even himself. 

He shivered violently in the fast-cooling room; normally he didn't mind the cold--- at least, not the cold outside him. It was the lump of ice in his chest, where his heart should have been, that had always sent him huddling under the quilts as a child, trying to warm something that the goosedown couldn't touch. 

But _she_ had. Without laying a hand on him, without being--- thank Merlin--- anything more to him than his best student _should _be, she had sent a finger of warmth into the chill inside him. That first peaceful evening working on the anti-lycanthropy potion--- the first time in a very long time he hadn't needed to shout or sneer in order to get results from a student, when she'd simply and efficiently anticipated his thoughts, or so it had seemed--- he'd found something like companionship from her. Found out he could still _feel_, like a human being. 

Not that it would have led anywhere improper--- his guts twisted with bitter longing as he imagined what it would have been like simply to have the pleasure of guiding that mind, in however small a way... to have someone around who didn't despise him. He didn't think he'd imagined her fascination, with the experimental process at least; she hadn't minded that it was him she was working with. 

And then Lucius Malfoy had taken that fragile rapport and twisted it forever. 

He felt his hands clench into fists. He wanted to wring the other man's neck--- or cast Cruciatus and make him writhe--- _while Hermione watched._

Not that it would heal her, mend the harm that he'd done her. But he rather thought she might like getting a little of her own back. There was a core of steel there that might let her surprise even herself.... He'd seen it a few times in class--- and out--- but tonight, watching as she reasoned her way into joining the living chess game, was the first time he'd truly appreciated her potential. 

If he hadn't already destroyed it. If it wasn't too late for her to own all that she was, thanks to him.... 

He forced himself to take a deep breath. He'd just have to _see_ to it than it wasn't, then, wouldn't he? To take care of her... give her the tools to get to the eighth square intact.... 

If it were possible. He knew all too well that pawns were he first piece to be sacrificed in any chess game. 

He forced himself to his feet, draped the cloak over his arm, and went back to the desk. 

Nothing less than asphodel and wormwood would do for tonight. And a bath in ice water. 


	7. Chapter 6: Bishop's Pawn

  
  


Chapter 6: Bishop's Pawn   
  


For some reason the corridors of Hogwarts seemed a lot darker and scarier than usual, even for the middle of the night. Wishing desperately for Harry's Invisibility Cloak, Hermione made for the corridor with the fruit basket painting that led to the kitchens. 

Even this late at night, the house-elves were still busy; or at least, some of them were. She spotted Dobby and Winky at once--- Dobby sitting on the hearth with a bottle of butterbeer, wearing one of his usual mismatched outfits and looking mutinous, Winky standing in front of him shaking one spindly finger at his nose. 

"You is a bad house-elf, Dobby," she was saying sharply. "You is getting above yourself and forgetting what you owes to our kind Master Dumbledore, when he is even _paying_ you for what house-elves is supposed to do for free---" 

So, Winky had finally decided to accept Hogwarts was her new home. Hermione wondered how that had come about--- but maybe finding out that Bartemius Crouch, her old master, was dead at the hands of his son had been enough. 

"I is doing what Professor Dumbledore wants," Dobby said sulkily, "but I is a free house-elf, Winky---" 

"OOOH!" she squealed, raising that finger again. 

Hermione decided it was time to interrupt. "Um--- excuse me---" 

Both house-elves jumped and turned around. Then Dobby squealed and jumped to his feet, knocking the butterbeer aside (and earning a disgusted look from Winky, who went to clean it up) and darted over to give her a hug. 

"It is Harry Potter's friend Herm-eye-knee!" the house-elf exclaimed, all the while knocking the breath out of her. "Herm-eye-knee, who is wanting all house-elves to be free like Dobby!" 

"Erm---" said Hermione, finding it hard to talk without any air in her lungs. She wondered, a little ruefully, if she was destined to have her name mispronounced by half the people she knew; Viktor never had gotten it right. Well, it was better than "Wheezy", which was Dobby's name for Ron. 

"Dobby is wondering when you would come to visit, and here you is!" the little creature said, letting go of her at last. 

Winky, who had finally finished mopping up the spilled butterbeer, came over to her and curtsied, very formally, a gesture that never failed to make Hermione wince. "Is there anything we can get you, miss?" Winky was always a little bit cool toward Hermione; she was, after all, a "proper" house-elf, with very strict ideas of what was proper and especially what was not. Things like wages and benefits definitely fell into the latter category where Winky was concerned. 

Dobby nodded enthusiastically. "We is always glad to help a friend of Harry Potter's, miss!" 

Winky glared at him. "_Good_ house-elves is always glad to help any humans they is supposed to," she said haughtily. 

After the events of the night, the very last thing Hermione felt like doing (except, perhaps, having to face Lucius Malfoy again without a very nice supply of weapons magical and otherwise) was becoming a bone of contention in what looked suspiciously like a house-elf domestic dispute. "Er---" she said, trying to collect her thoughts--- "I don't suppose I could have a snack of some kind---" 

Winky cheered up immensely at that. "Right away, missy!" she said brightly, and dashed off; before Hermione could even register the house-elf's departure, Winky was back, bearing a truly fine one-person midnight supper on a tray twice as big as she was. 

"Here we is, missy!" said Winky happily, setting the tray down on the nearest table, while Dobby held out a chair for her. 

"Oh, this is too much---" Hermione began; despite what... Professor Snape (it was hard to think about him without a little flutter in her stomach) had said about house-elves, she didn't like to take advantage. 

"No, no, missy!" said Winky, then added, a little shyly, "Some of us was thinking that you weren't liking us, because you is coming down and trying to get us to---" she gave Dobby a nasty look--- "forget our place as good house-elves." She brightened up. "But now Winky knows you likes us, and we will tell the others---" she elbowed Dobby. "Won't we?" 

"Er---" said Dobby, looking a little depressed that Hermione might have changed her mind about house-elf rights, "That's right, Herm-eye-knee!" 

Hermione blinked in surprise; then, as there seemed nothing else sensible to do, she took the offered chair. The two house-elves stood next to her, waiting with looks of eager anticipation on their faces (even though Dobby hadn't helped with the food). 

"Er--- won't the two of you sit down?" she asked, and, at Dobby's grateful look and Winky's horrified one, "I'd very much like it if you would." 

"Well, if miss wants---" said Winky dubiously, and perched herself on the edge of a chair, looking faintly horrified at her own daring. Hermione, feeling much relieved now that the house-elf wasn't regarding her with that anxious gaze, took a spoonful of soup, which was, as she'd expected, delicious. 

"Herm-eye-knee is as great and good a witch as her friend Harry Potter is a wizard!" said Dobby enthusiastically, seating himself with no trace of Winky's reluctance. He eyed her keenly. "But what is Herm-eye-knee doing up at this hour, when all the other students is snug in their beds?" 

Hermione blanched--- then decided that this was the perfect opportunity to start fine-tuning her "discretion." "I was working on an experiment with Professor Snape," she explained, proud of the steadiness in her voice, "and it took longer than we thought." 

Winky clucked disapprovingly. "Professor Snape should not be keeping you out so late, miss," she said. "It isn't seemly--- and this a holiday!" She looked most upset. 

Dobby regarded her curiously. "And what is you staying here for, Herm-eye-knee?" he asked. "Your name isn't down on the list---" 

Winky gave a squeak and hopped to her feet. "Oh! Miss's bed isn't being made up, because the other house-elves isn't knowing that miss is here!" she exclaimed. "Winky must go make miss's bed for her---" She started to dash off. 

"Er--- aren't there other house-elves doing those chores tonight?" Hermione asked. In her trips to the kitchen last year trying to persuade the elves to stand up for themselves, she'd learned a good bit about their duty rosters. 

"Yes, miss, but they isn't knowing---" 

"Well, wouldn't they be hurt if you did their job for them, instead of just letting them know?" Hermione said over Winky's protest. 

The house-elf looked startled, then bobbed slightly. "Miss is right," she said at last. "Winky will let the others know, and then come back." and the little elf dashed off. 

Hermione finished the rest of her meal in between answering the occasional questions which punctuated Dobby's rather random monologue. She wanted very much to ask if he knew anything about the ancestry of his kind that Snape had hinted at, but had a shrewd suspicion that it would rather offend the elves. 

She was just--- in defiance of manners, but she didn't think that breach of courtesy would matter during a kitchen raid--- mopping up the last of her soup with the cheesy crust of her croque-monsieur, when Winky came scurrying back into the kitchen. "Your room is all in readiness, miss!" she said happily. "I is telling the others to get it ready spit-spot for you!" 

Hermione blinked at the anxious look on the elf's face. It was _very_ hard to imagine Winky as anything nearly as nasty as goblins. She'd have to get those books from... Professor Snape... and soon. 

"Er, thanks," she said, getting to her feet; Dobby hopped out of his chair as well. 

"Is miss wanting anything else?" Winky asked anxiously. "Winky can get it for you---" 

"Oh, goodness, no," Hermione said hastily, then, remembering the house-elf's earlier concern, added, "Everything was delicious, thanks--- but really, it's time I turned in---" 

By the time she finally snuck out of the kitchen, several minutes and assorted exhortations later, she had all but resolved to head straight to the library--- as a prefect, she had after-hours privileges--- and look up some of those books on house-elves. 

But the thought of those dark and empty corridors was more than she could bear--- especially now that the caloric overload had joined forces with the shock to leave her trembly and yawning. She decided the house-elves could wait until tomorrow, and headed for Gryffindor tower with all the haste she could muster. 

The Fat Lady raised her eyebrow at Hermione's arrival. "Getting in a little late, aren't we, dear?" she asked reprovingly. "And you a prefect!" The picture looked at her more keenly. "And I thought you weren't staying this holiday---" 

Hermione shook her head wearily. "If you want to call Professor McGonagall," she said, "be my guest." 

But the Fat Lady was now regarding her with something more like concern. "No, dear," she said gently. "I think you'd best go up to bed--- and Professor McGonagall will likely know all about whatever's kept you up by morning, with or without my help." She swung aside to admit Hermione. "Now, go on up and get some rest, love." 

Hermione climbed through the picture, feeling a new set of worries add themselves to her mind. Whatever was she going to tell Professor McGonagall--- if nothing else, her Head of House would undoubtedly want to know why she'd changed her mind about staying--- 

Well, she could only hope that the Headmaster would explain everything. And if worst came to worst, she supposed she could always insist to Professor McGonagall that they speak with him.... Which thought brought her to the upper floors of the girls' side of Gryffindor Tower. 

Instead of dormitories, the prefects and Sixth Form students had single rooms--- or double, if they chose to share, which Hermione most emphatically didn't. And she was never more grateful for that fact than tonight, when she could slip undisturbed into her private little turret bedroom and lock the door on the world. 

The house-elves had, as promised, made up the bed; but suddenly the idea of stretching out on clean sheets after lying in Malfoy's dungeon made her skin crawl. 

A bath. That was what she needed. And fortunately, she didn't have to go all the way out to the prefects' bath to get one. 

Her lip twisted in something that wasn't very like a smile--- under the circumstances, the thought wasn't a pleasant one--- as she remembered the lecture Professor McGonagall had given the new prefects at the beginning of the year regarding one of the "normally unspoken purposes of Hogwarts". "_Witches and wizards are a rare breed indeed,_" she'd said dryly. "_And one of the roles that Hogwarts plays is to encourage--- er--- the preservation of the species."_

In other words, the older students at least were encouraged to form relationships of the sort that would lead to marriage once they'd graduated. Which meant that, although there were certain rules on the books regarding public displays of affection and involvement among students, the prefects were required to interpret those rules liberally, with an emphasis on safety and physical and mental health rather than "virtue". It also meant that there were any number of interesting little nooks and crannies in the building--- the Founders Four had apparently had that idea first. 

And one of those little nooks was an intimate bathing room at the top of the tower next to Gryffindor's. 

There was a little accessway that led between Gryffindor Tower and that room--- it had its own password, which was only given to the prefects and students sixteen and over (Hermione supposed that the Headmaster thought that the prefects would be mature enough to handle the complications of such an involvement). Hermione had never used it--- never wanted to, not having anyone she felt that way about since Viktor's mother had sent her packing. And, after tonight, she wasn't certain she'd felt "that way" about Viktor, either--- their explorations hadn't made her feel anything like--- 

She chopped off that line of thought in a hurry, telling herself she was far too tired to analyze _anything_ important tonight. But the little bathing-chamber (as with the prefects' bath; it would be an injustice to call it merely a "bathroom") would be a good place to get clean in _private_. The school was nearly deserted this year--- more so than usual: so many people hd stayed last year for the Christmas ball that nearly everyone was anxious to get home this year, or their parents were anxious for them to. When the list had gone round, there hadn't been more than a handful of names on it. 

She padded up the winding stairs and through the door; it had its own locking system, but she reinforced it with a couple of hexes of her own, and made certain the "in-use" marker was flashing, before she turned to look at the bathing-chamber. 

It was a small room, almost cozy, most of its space taken up by the deep round bathtub in the center, with a dozen spouts along the edges. Unlike the prefects' bath, it wasn't done in the white marble which Hermione had always privately considered ostentatious, but in warm reddish terra cotta that absorbed rather than reflected the glow of the huge thick candles set on sconces at different levels around the walls. 

The huge fireplace opposite the tub was cold, but her Fumos Charm took care of that. She hung her dressing-gown and pajamas (she was still dressed in her school robes) on a rack at the far end and began to explore. A good rummage through the bathing condiments would be just the thing to calm her down. 

The cupboards boasted heaps of thick Turkish towels, bath sponges and washcloths--- though that wasn't all they held. As a prefect, Hermione was pleased to note that one of the cupboards was stocked with various types of anti-conception potions and instructions for the Contraceptus Charm--- but right now, that _wasn't_ anything she wanted to think about needing. She closed that door hastily and resumed her rummage. 

The taps around the bath, like the ones downstairs, held different kinds of bubble bath--- though some of these were rather... strong. She hastily turned off a _very_ silky flood of bright red patchouli bubbles that wanted to cling most alarmingly to her skin, and settled on a more diffident spill of purple-blue plumeria froth for her bath. 

It didn't take very long for the tub to fill; she turned off the tap and reached for the fastening at the neck of her robe. 

And froze, as a flash of memory--- _Lucius Malfoy's eyes glinted lewdly as his spell stripped away her clothing--- _ripped through her mind, shattering the sense of safety she'd begun to weave for herself. She shuddered violently, feeling suddenly vulnerable, exposed, despite the privacy and safety of this place. 

For a moment, she couldn't move, could only huddle into herself and shake. Then reason intruded; she clenched her fists tightly, forced herself to take deep calming breaths. _Is this any way for a Gryffindor to act? Some bravery! _And--- memory of Snape's silky voice, but kindly now, safe thought--- _How can you hope to reach the eighth square if you can't even bring yourself to take a bath?_

That thought steadied her, and she unfastened her robe determinedly, drew it over her head, and made herself walk, naked, to the wall and hang it on the hook next to her dressing-gown. 

It felt like there were eyes on her, everywhere. Her back tingled, and she wanted to run. But she made herself walk back to the tub, straight-backed, not hiding, not trying to cover herself--- _there's _no one _here, you _IDIOT!--- and slipped in to the water. 

The foamy bubbles wrapped around her, not clinging, but covering modestly, and she buried herself in the mounds of foam, then slid under the water to wet her hair in the flowery bubbles. 

She surfaced, leaned back against the edge of the tub, and concentrated, hard, on making the shameful slimy feel of her skin slough away in the clean hot water. _I'm all right. I haven't done anything to be ashamed of--- it's Lucius Malfoy who shouldn't be able to look in his mirror tomorrow, right?_

Mr. Malfoy... and Professor Snape? 

That thought startled her a little, and she forced herself to turn it over in her mind. 

It would be nice to hate him--- just to put all the shame and the queasiness she felt onto his shoulders. It would be easy and simple and she wouldn't have to think about the confused tangle of emotions that his voice called up in her every time he spoke. 

Easy--- but not fair. Not _right_. And he--- her mind forced the fact on her--- had been more than fair to her tonight. Hadn't taken the easy path. He could have hurt her, very badly. Could have let Malfoy do it. Could have done a thousand other things. He certainly hadn't had to take such care of her when they came back to Hogwarts. Hadn't had to offer her the chance to become a queen--- when that was exactly what she needed. 

No, she couldn't hate him. But what exactly she could feel for him... she wasn't sure. She had begun to like him, before this horrible night, of that she was certain. The mind lurking behind those glittering eyes was quite familiar to her in the way it seemed to work. And he had liked her--- _Slytherin could use a mind like yours...._ There had been something there, the sort of fondness she felt for and from so many of her other teachers.... But what that fondness would become after tonight, she had no idea.... 

A memory floated up, of cuddling into his lap, of hands that were gentle without being seductive, of feeling quite suddenly safe. And that feeling blended over into the memory of safety that the seduction in those hands had offered in place of terror and pain.... 

The water lapping against her skin felt unaccountably sensual, warm and caressing. She moved a little in the water, remembering warm hands and pleasure.... 

Her own hands moved, of their own accord, up into her hair--- innocent, innocent, yes?--- then, guiltily, down her neck and under the deep hot water.... 

_Could I do it to myself? Just have it for myself, just... feel good?_

One hand moved lightly to a breast, just barely touching... cupping... stroking--- 

FLASH_._ _Long wonderful fingers on her body--- Lucius Mafoy's sneering face--- Snape's dark and glittering eyes as his hands excited her---_

She jerked her hand away, as if burned. Well, she had been. 

Was this what it would be like for her... every time? Was she never going to feel... anything... without thinking of tonight? 

Shivering violently, she sunk herself under the water, which felt suddenly cold. 

She drained the tub, started to refill it, and--- determinedly--- got out and went to the cupboards for a sponge. 

It took a long time, soaking in the hot water, scrubbing her body impersonally clean, before she felt anything like herself again. 


	8. Chapter 7: Return to the Board

  
  


Chapter 7: Return to the Board   
  


For a moment when she woke, Hermione strongly considered staying in bed for the rest of the holiday. She had all her course books here in her room, and some snack foods tucked away (she'd imposed quite enough on Winky and Dobby... though she suspected that those snacks would be replenished on a regular basis and without comment should she decide on this course of action). There wasn't any need to face the outside world--- 

_The eighth square._

That was a reason. And so (she admitted, albeit reluctantly, to herself) was a certain pair of glittering dark eyes. 

She'd expected nightmares--- if she managed to sleep. But the combination of the bath and food (perhaps, said a painfully honest corner of her mind) had worked a more subtle magic than any charm, and her sleep had been untroubled. Mostly. Except for the aforementioned dark eyes... which somehow soothed and excited rather than frightened. 

Which, she decided pragmatically, was all for the best. She was going to be seeing him every day for the next several months--- she couldn't very well cringe every time he looked her way! 

And skulking here in her bedroom wasn't getting her any closer to the eighth square. She pushed back the covers resolutely and headed for the shortcut to the prefects' bathroom. 

Over her ablutions, she pondered--- a smile came to her face through the mouthful of toothpaste--- her strategy. Pawn though she was, it was her job to direct some of the pieces. 

Specifically, Harry and Ron. She couldn't not tell them some of what had happened--- if only because they needed to be in on the subterfuge, for it to be effective. Truth to tell, she wasn't much of a liar, though she could misdirect quite skillfully when she had to. 

But that didn't mean she would--- or could--- tell them the whole story. For one thing, they'd both lose their minds, Ron especially. Another smile, this one wry (and under the shower spray--- she always needed a shower first thing in the morning, even if she _had_ had a bath the night before). Ron hadn't liked her with Viktor--- this would absolutely break him. 

Not to mention that it would be too impossibly embarrassing to tell them. They were her friends... but they were _boys_, and there were just some things you didn't talk about with boys, things they wouldn't understand. 

The thought came as a shock to her, so much so that she missed a stroke combing her hair (having moved from sink to shower to the benches around the edge of the room--- the only time she could comb her hair was when it was wet). She didn't have any _girl_ friends, just Harry and Ron. And frankly, there wasn't really anyone else to be friends _with_ in her year. Parvati and Lavender were just not possible (all giggles and Trelawny-worship--- _would_ that _ever_ wear off?). Hufflepuffs were... Hufflepuffs, the Slytherin girls were Pansy Parkinson's gang, and she didn't _see_ enough of the Ravenclaws--- well, that wasn't true. Ramona Roberts in her Arithmancy class was nice enough, but... the simple truth was, she'd always been too busy with Ron and Harry. There was Ginny, but she was Ron's sister, and frankly adored Harry--- _and_, more importantly, she was a year younger, and didn't need that kind of weight on her shoulders. But that meant that now, when Hermione _needed_ a girlfriend, she didn't have one. 

It would have been awfully nice to indulge in a bout of self-pity about that... but she had to admit it was her own fault. And you didn't, for goodness' sake, make friends because _you_ "needed" them. You were friends because... well, you were _friends_. 

And it was time for her to go down and talk to her _friends_. She settled her robes on her shoulders, pushed back her mostly-dry hair, and headed for the Gryffindor common room.   
  


*****   
  


If she hadn't been so nervous about talking to Harry and Ron, their reactions to seeing her would have been _very _funny indeed. They were playing wizard chess in front of the fire--- her guts flip-flopped at the sight--- while Ginny watched, and when Hermione appeared, they managed to knock the board half into the hearth. 

"Good morning, nice to see you thanks, I'm fine, how are you?" she said dryly as they scrambled about picking up the pieces. Several of those had gone running to escape the fire and she gathered the poor things up and deposited them on the table as Ron and Harry righted the board. 

"But--- Hermione---" Ron spluttered. 

"We thought you were going home." Harry pushed his glasses up on his nose and regarded her curiously. 

They had, for once, the common room all to themselves--- no other Gryffindor was staying, for which favor Hermione thanked Merlin. It hadn't been this deserted since their second year. She summoned a chair between theirs and sat. "I was---" 

"Then---" Ron frowned--- "why aren't you there?" 

Harry gave him a _look_. "I think she was about to tell us," he said meaningfully. 

_Right in one._ But the jocular words stuck in her throat. She leaned closer to the boys--- fighting a little twitch as Ron leaned in too, a little closer than she would have liked. "Listen--- something's happened--- and you have to promise me you won't breathe a word of it." She waited until both boys and Ginny crossed their hearts. "Ok... the short version is, Lucius Malfoy snatched me from Platform 9 3/4 last night." 

Their reactions were predictable. Ginny gasped, and covered her mouth with her hands--- obviously falling under the bad influence of Brown/Patil, as a prefect Hermione would _have_ to do something about that--- Ron leapt to his feet, swearing, and Harry pulled him back down, his eyes narrowing behind his glasses. "What happened?" he said in a low voice. 

"He--- he---" she didn't have to fake a stammer as the initial horror of being in that little room came to her--- "Apparated me to--- a dungeon, I found out later it's in his house---" 

"Figures Malfoy to have a dungeon," Harry said disgustedly. 

Ginny shuddered. "And that he'd do something like _that_." Ginny, Hermione remembered, was a fellow victim of Lucius Malfoy's general vileness. For a moment, Hermione entertained the wistful notion of getting her somewhere alone and explaining--- 

_No, Granger, that's selfish squared. She's been through enough--- doesn't need you crying on her shoulder on top of it. _

"There was--- he called it a Dark Revel---" small misdirection, but close enough--- "a gathering of Death Eaters---" She closed her eyes, hearing Snape's voice: _"basically, an opportunity for Lord Voldemort's followers to get together and indulge some of their more depraved pleasures."_ That, coupled with her memories of the dungeon, gave her fodder for the next bit of misdirection--- "it was horrible---" 

Ron put what he must have thought was a comforting arm around her shoulders; she had to fight not to flinch. "It would have to be," Harry muttered, and Ginny's voice was like a lifeline. "How did you get away?" 

She grasped at it, turning a little so that Ron's arm fell away. "It wasn't anything I did--- it was Professor Snape, he was there---" 

"At a gathering of _Death Eaters_?" Ron's voice rose in horror. "That--- that---" 

"Oh, Ron, don't be thick," she said impatiently, feeling a kind of guilty relief at badgering him in their usual way. "_You_know Snape used to be a Death Eater--- you were there when he showed Fudge his arm last year---" 

"Right--- 'used to be'," said Harry. "Which doesn't explain what he was doing with them now." He fixed her with an inquiring look. Ginny, to Hermione's surprise, had started when Hermione said Snape's name--- but now she looked thoughtful rather than confused, despite the fact that _she_ hadn't been present at the aforementioned incident last year. 

"Oh, honestly!" Now that she was with her friends, she felt herself slipping back into the familiar role--- the brain, the bossy know-it-all--- with no little relief. She wasn't always comfortable in it, but it was at least familiar. Normal. Safe. 

_You don't have to be like that with _him, said a little voice in her mind. He _doesn't mind when you think--- _he_ likes it when you have an idea---_

She told the little voice to shut up, rather firmly. 

"Didn't you figure it out?" she asked, looking from one to the other of the boys--- Ginny obviously had, which confused her no end, but she'd sort that out later. "He's a double agent--- that's what the Headmaster sent him off to do last year, and that's what he was doing---" she swallowed--- "last night." 

Harry blinked. "How d'you mean?" 

"He was getting information--- there was a lot of alcohol around, I think---" she'd smelled it on Malfoy when he tied her up, and that was early on--- "and I guess he figured it would loosen some tongues." She took a deep breath. "Anyway, when he saw me---" 

"Wait." Ron was finally catching on. "What'd Malfoy bring you there for anyway?" 

Before she could answer, Ginny, to her surprise, spoke up. "Oh, honestly, Ron--- what do _you_ think he was going to do to her?" she sighed in exasperation, then reached out and put a hand on Hermione's arm. Hermione covered it with her own, grateful twice over--- for the sympathy, and the fact that Ginny had planted the appropriate seed for misdirection, so that she herself didn't have to. 

Harry looked sick. "Have a little fun, probably---" 

"Like that lot at the World Cup last year," Ron finished. "That scum!" He looked ready to hit something. 

Harry put a comforting hand on her shoulder. _Now, why doesn't that make me twitch, like Ron's did?_ "What happened?" he asked again, gently. 

"Snape--- when he saw what Mr. Malfoy was... was going to do---" well that was true enough--- "he... talked him out of it." 

"How?" Ron was blatantly suspicious--- and rightly so, but she didn't want to tell him that, of course. 

"I--- I don't know." Which, again, was sort of true. "I couldn't hear everything--- at least, not then--- and---" she put on a rather dry mask, and continued with some asperity, "you'll forgive me if I don't remember all the details letter-perfect." 

"Of course you don't," Harry said, silencing Ron's worried outburst with a look. "Go on--- I mean, if you want to," he added hastily. 

She nodded, a little shakily. "Well, after Snape got me out of there, he told me that he'd told Mr. Malfoy that he could... turn me into a spy. Make me tell him things about Harry, and, well, manipulate you---" she looked at Harry--- "through things he told me." 

"That's stretching, isn't it?" Ron said. "I mean, why would you believe anything _Snape_ says?" He said the name like it was a mucus-coated maggot. 

"Well, there's more than one way of getting people to do something, isn't there?" she told him sharply, wincing inwardly at how close he'd gotten. "I mean, look at how, our first year, we all thought he was trying to steal the Philosopher's Stone! Quirrel manipulated us _using_ our--- dislike--- of Snape, didn't he?" Now she was really warmed up. "And all that time, Snape was trying to _save_ Harry!" She took a deep breath. "Manipulating us doesn't mean we have to like him." 

Harry frowned. "Well, that's true, I guess," he said slowly, clearly not wanting to believe it. "But--- Ron's right---" 

"Oh, thanks," Ron said sarcastically. 

"It _is_ kind of far-fetched, isn't it?" 

Hermione shrugged. "No more so than that Professor Moody was really Barty Crouch, right?" 

Even Ron had to laugh at that. 

Harry pushed his glasses back up his nose. "So--- what are we going to do?" 

Hermione blinked in shock; she hadn't expected it would be this easy. "Do?" 

"About... this plan of Snape's." Harry looked from one to the other of them. 

"Yeah--- I mean, it's not like we're going to let him lead us around by the noses!" said Ron hotly. 

"Do you honestly think he'd have _told_ me, if that's what he was going to do?" Hermione asked impatiently. "I know you don't like him, Ron, but give him credit for _some_ intelligence at least." 

Ron shrugged, clearly not liking it--- then sat up with a look on his face that was all too familiar to Hermione from her relationship with Viktor. "What'd you mean 'you'? I didn't think you liked him any better than we do!" He stared at her accusingly. 

Hermione smacked her forehead mentally. _Stupid, Granger, stupid!_ Professor Snapewas right about her discretion! "Well, it's rather hard not to like someone when they save you from something like Lucius Malfoy--- or a troll." She gave him a speaking look. 

"Here, here," said Ginny quietly, looking at Harry, who had saved _her_ from Lord Voldemort. Hermione hoped devoutly that no one was going to connect the dots.... 

Harry laughed. "Well, I hope we're not as hard to like as Snape." 

"Well, _I _was, our first year, wasn't I?" Hermione teased. 

"No, you weren't," Ron said instantly, patting her arm, and she and Harry both looked at him in surprise. "I mean--- not as hard as _Snape_," he amended hastily. 

"Oh, thanks," Hermione said sarcastically. "But really," she said, in her best serious-things voice, "as far as Snape's 'plan' goes--- I don't think it is one--- I mean, it's more a matter of waiting and seeing what You-Know-Who tries to do---" 

"Just like always." Harry looked bitter. "Just once I wish we could get ahead of him--- act, not react." 

It was the first time she'd ever heard Harry say anything like that, and judging from the look on Ron's face it was news to him too. She opened her mouth to say something--- when the portrait opened, and Professor McGonagall walked in. 

Their Head of House glanced around the room swiftly, then made straight for them, her mouth set in a thin line. "Miss Granger---" she said. "May I speak with you in private?" 

Hermione got up, but Harry said, "Professor McGonagall--- is this about--- what happened to Hermione last night?" 

McGonagall looked surprised, then her eyes narrowed and she looked at Hermione. "You've told them?" 

"Er--- I was, when you came in." Hermione wondered just how much McGonagall knew. 

The older woman gave a long-suffering look. "I might have known--- well, you lot---" she fixed the boys in particular with a sharp look--- "your friend has been through a very difficult experience, and I _suggest_---" the irony hung heavily in the air--- "that you give her all the support she needs. Miss Granger," she added, turning to Hermione with a suddenness that made her jump, "I'd still like to speak with you in private. Come along---" And the swept off, leaving Hermione to exchange glances with the others--- theirs confused, hers shamming it and worried--- and hurry after.   
  


*****   
  


McGonagall led her up a narrow staircase and through a corridor that Hermione recognized: all the Gryffindor prefects knew how to reach the private entrance to Professor McGonagall's rooms, in case they needed to get to her in a hurry some night. All the younger students thought it was some kind of magic the way she could appear at the first hint of disturbance; and so it was, but it was the magic of the castle's design. 

Professor McGonagall's sitting room was neatly furnished with a lot of bookshelves and comfortable chairs that somehow managed to be proper at the same time. She motioned Hermione into one and sat behind her desk--- a duplicate of the one in her office. 

"Hermione," she said gently, dropping the formality in private--- a mark of favor that usually pleased Hermione; McGonagall didn't call even all the prefects by their first names. But this morning, somehow, it didn't distract her from her nerves. How much _did_ Professor McGonagall know? 

"Professor Dumbledore told me about... what happened to you last night," she said in the gentlest tone Hermione had ever heard her use, "and I'm--- sorry doesn't seem enough," she said finally--- then added with a trace of her usual crispness, "though I'm going to have to rethink my opinion of Severus Snape--- I'd never have thought he'd stick his neck out like that for any student, let alone a Gryffindor Muggle-born--- it's not everyone who could talk Lucius Malfoy out of his perversions---" 

Hermione breathed a sigh of relief that she kept wholly mental: it didn't sound like Professor McGonagall knew what Professor Snape had _really_ done--- or she wouldn't be talking with any trace of respect about him. 

But all the same, Hermione couldn't help feeling a strange sort of wistful twinge. It would have been awfully good to really _talk_ with another woman about what had happened.... She didn't know how she knew that, she just _did_. 

"But that's by the way," Professor McGonagall interrupted her thoughts. "Hermione, please, if there's anything I can do---" 

"Er--- I don't think so, not... right now anyway." Hermione answered by rote. 

"And now--- a question if you don't mind," McGonagall said gently. "How much did you tell Potter and the Weasleys?" 

"Er--- well, I told them that Mr. Malfoy---" 

"You needn't speak of him with any kind of respect, Hermione," McGonagall cut in crisply, "not after---" She pursed her lips together. "But go on." 

"I told them that he'd kidnaped me," she said, "and that Professor Snape talked him out of hurting me--- but I didn't say exactly what he would have done." 

"That's probably for the best," McGonagall said. "I know they're your friends and all--- but there are some things that most males will never understand--- and what it takes to make them understand isn't something I'd wish on anyone. When I think of the things I saw in the last war...." Her eyes went abstract, looking at something Hermione could only extrapolate. 

Before she could ask, however, McGonagall's eyes refocused and she continued. "And as you've no doubt decided for yourself, Miss Weasley has already been through her own trial by fire, and it's probably better to let her... have what's left of her innocence while she can." Hermione's heart gave a wrench at the last words, thinking of how Ron's hand had made her twitch. No, she wouldn't wish that on Ginny, even vicariously. 

McGonagall's eyes gentled again. "Let me know if there's anything I can do for you, all right, child?" 

Hermione almost flinched--- it was the same tone of voice Snape used when he called her "child"--- and she had the sense that both of them meant the exact opposite. Very peculiar. "I--- I will," she said. "And--- thank you." 

McGonagall's eyes were very kind. "Don't thank me, Hermione--- from what the Headmaster tells me, you showed the bravery of Godric Gryffindor himself last night." 

There was an awkward pause, then Hermione asked, "Should I--- is that---" 

"'All' doesn't seem like the right word, does it?" McGonagall said as if she knew what Hermione was thinking. "Yes, that's it--- though if you'd rather stay up here for lunch---" 

"Lunch!" Hermione exclaimed. 

"Yes," said McGonagall dryly, "you missed breakfast altogether--- not that I blame you. But you're probably famished--- go on, if you like." 

Hermione experienced a bizarre sort of deja vu: for the second time in less than twenty-four hours, a professor was ordering her out of their office to go and eat--- though the circumstances couldn't have been more different. "All right," she said, getting to her feet. "Thank you---" 

"As I said, dear, no thanks needed." McGonagall's eyes on her were still kind. "Now, go along, if you like." 

Hermione went.   
  


*****   
  


Severus Snape had been awakened a good few hours before Hermione--- awakened by a heavy, coiling weight cuddled across him and to one side. 

"Esmé," he said wearily, "would you mind?" 

A second later, a blunt sleek head about the size of a soup bowl poked out from under the quilt. "The fire went out, and it wassssss cold," said the creature. "And I'm a reptile, in casssssse you've forgotten." 

"Nonsense," Snape said, stroking the blunt-nosed head, feeling the surprising softness of feathers under his fingers. "You're as warm-blooded as I am." 

"Which, according to your sssssssstudentsssssss, isssss not very," Esmé grumped, cuddling tighter against him. 

Snape grunted sharply as the quetxal's body squeezed the air from his chest. "Esmé, would you kindly desist?" he gasped, and added, "Corpses make dreadful hot-water bottles." 

"And you would know, I sssssssuppossssse?" she retorted, but uncoiled herself part way from around him. Snape took a deep, grateful breath. "When isssssss breakfassssssst?" 

"When you catch it yourself," Snape said irritably, starting to worm his way out from under covers and quetxal, ignoring Esmé's irked protest. The bandage over his left wrist tried to slip loose. 

"Thesssssse featherssssss make it hard to ssssssslither properly," the quetxal whined. 

"Yes, but they _should_ keep you warm," Snape answered her, "_if_ you'd have the sense to puff up like a bird, instead of ignoring half your heritage." 

"Lookssssss sssssstupid," Esmé whined. 

"And cuddling up like a kitten doesn't?" Snape said, and, tired of their old argument, resorted to his usual doomsday weapon: throwing back the covers and letting the cold air in. 

Underneath the covers was the not inconsiderable bulk of Esmé: six feet of sleek lime-green and midnight black feathers arranged along the skin of what should have been a very scaly constrictor snake: a quetxal, literally a "feathered serpent"--- or, as his cousin Claudia called them, feather boas. Like the house-elves, the quetxal were a relic of his many times-great-aunt Esmeralda the Transformer's creativity. 

Esmé hissed at him, rustling her feathers together. "Cold," she whined. 

"I should have gotten a mank instead of you," he told her, taking advantage of her distraction to slide out from underneath the heavy coils. "They at least keep themselves warm." Both quetxal and mank had been an attempt to produce warm-blooded reptiles. The mank, snakes with the plush fur of mink, shed their skins, snake-fashion, several times a year, providing a steady supply of cruelty-free fur. Not that Great-Aunt Esmeralda had likely given a damn, but one mank could produce as much fur in its lifetime as several hundred mink, and--- perhaps a relic of their serpentine ancestry--- they were docile, attacking only when provoked, unlike the warm-blooded portion of their ancestry. 

"Mank are ssssssstupid," Esmé hissed, glaring balefully up at him. "Can't even talk Parssssseltongue, let alone human languagesssssss like a quetsssssssssal." For whatever reason, quetxal were considerably more intelligent than their relatives--- hence the unusually large heads. 

"At the moment, a creature that cannot talk would be a welcome companion," Snape told her, pulling on his dressing gown and heading for the bath. The silence behind him told him he'd scored a point. 

The bathroom attached to his chambers was one of the odd advantages of rooming in the dungeons, and proof that even vile things could be put to good use. The small room adjoining his quarters had once been a torture chamber. 

_Appropriate, given its current occupant...._ Snape cut off that line of thought in a hurry. 

Many of the accouterments of its past incarnation were still in place: Snape thought the chains hanging from the walls added a certain _je ne sais quoi_ to the decor, and made a convenient place to hang towels and clothing. The water-torture chamber had easily converted to a shower, and the old boiling pot had gracefully made the transition into a hot tub--- a not dissimilar use, he reflected as he filled the appliance in question, particularly given his preference for near-scalding baths. Not that anything was going to get the oil out of his skin and hair for good, short of an extended, painful, and costly stay in St. Mungo's, but he couldn't help trying. 

He slid into the water while the tub was still half-full, and turned on the cycling system, slid the bandages off his wrist and let the bloodstains soak off. It had healed with unusual speed; it always did. Except for the part he wanted to heal--- a scar on soul rather than body.... 

Esmé came in before he'd finished, slouching along the floor like a lame caterpillar--- the poor thing really did have a case about her feathers being useless as instruments of propulsion; they afforded her absolutely no traction. She eeled her way up among the chains and came to suspend herself above him, lowering her head until they were eye-level, at a conversational distance--- yet another reason to leave the chains in place. "You're ssssssscrubbing your sssssssskin off," she said, sounding--- for once--- worried. 

"Just the top layer," he reassured her dryly, dunking his head underwater to rinse--- hence the cyclers. "Bless Mother's black heart," he added sarcastically, coming up and started to scrub at his hair again. 

"Humanssssss aren't ssssssuppossssed to molt," Esmé objected, watching long dark hairs swirl away in the cyclers' jets along with the now-greasy soapsuds. 

"And hair and skin aren't supposed to exude enough oil to power a fleet of Muggle motorcars, either," he told her, blinking soap out of his eyes. "But thanks to Mother and her teaching methods---" He broke off to rinse again. 

When he came up, it was to find himself literally nose-to-nose with the quetxal. She flicked her forked tongue at him, tasting his scent. "You sssssssmell more than clean," she said, "unless it isssss the 'scent' of Darknessssss on your sssssspirit." She drew back to regard him one more from a conversational distance. "What happened lassssssst night? You did not come home until very late." 

He sighed, knowing they'd come around to this. And it was one of the reasons he kept the feathered pest as his familiar: Esmé knew when to ask--- she hadn't pestered him last night, had waited until this morning, _after_ he'd finished his ablutions, to ask the questions that were most certainly burning her serpentine heart. Tact, she had, did Esmé, when it counted. "It was... a Dark Revel," he began, not _quite_ stalling, but not wanting to launch into the worst of it without preparing her. "You know what that means." 

Esmé, in a surprising gesture of affection, dropped down to bump her head against his. "I know," she hissed into his ear. "But that doesssssss not eksssssssplain your latenesssssss--- you would have left asssss sssssssoon asssss possssssssible." 

He sighed, reaching up to pet the feathered head gently; Esmé squeezed her eyes shut--- like her avian ancestors, she had eyelids--- in pleasure. "Malfoy had brought me... his idea of a present---" 

Esmé's eyes opened, and she reared up in midair. "Hissssss idea of a presssssent would be sssssssomething foul." 

"And it was." He took a deep breath, pondering how to explain the full horror and severity of the occasion to a creature for whom mating was as uncomplicated an act as eating. "You remember I had Hermione Granger working as my assistant on the anti-lycanthropy potion?" 

"The Gryffindor Muggle-born--- yesssss." 

"Well... Malfoy, pervert that he is, decided that he knew my 'true' interest in the girl, and made me a present of her, to use--- to assault, Esmé. To _abuse_, in the vilest way possible." 

The quetxal hissed, coiling about in midair. "He would. What did you do?" 

Here was the part that her feathered little brain would never comprehend. "I... made it appear that I was... seducing her--- twisting her mind so that I could use her as a spy." 

Snakes--- even quetxals--- don't have much in the way of facial expressions; yet Esmé managed to convey quite clearly her confusion. "How?" 

He petted the head again. "How many times do I have to tell you, featherbrain--- humans are different from other animals, and sex is one of the areas of greatest difference." 

"Yessssss.... alwaysssss in heat," she said boredly, then did a double-take--- a move quite effective on someone whose entire body, at the moment, was functioning as a neck: she made an S-curve in the air to look back at him. "What doesssss mating have to do with Malfoy'ssssss fun and gamessssss?" 

"I've told you about the Dark Revels, Esmé," he said wearily, not wanting to relive the experience again for the curiosity of a feathered snake. "Malfoy thought I'd want to---" 

"Mate with a ssssstudent?" Esmé hissed, managing, once again, to convey an expression of disgust. The quetxal regarded mating as just another biological activity... but she had enough understanding of human customs and psychology to realize the implications. Like a bird, she was warm-blooded... and she had a bird's sense of caring for the young. 

"Yes, and in a way that she wouldn't enjoy in the least--- to put it mildly." He sunk lower in the water, anticipating the next question, hoping it wouldn't come. 

"I will never undersssssstand humansssss," Esmé said finally, making a loop-the-loop in the air. "Sssssso I asssssume what you did with the girl... more human mating ritualssssss?" 

"In a sense," he said, relieved that Esmé hadn't required too much explanation. He'd never had to discuss such things with the quetxal--- by the time she'd come into his life, he'd already sworn off such involvement... mostly owing to things he'd seen and done as a Death Eater. "It was... less traumatic for her than what Lucius intended, but...." He felt the pain rising up in waves as it had last night. "Esmé--- I hurt her. _I hurt her_--- and it was my fault that she was even there." If he hadn't been so weak--- so starved for contact with a mind of equal brilliance, no matter in what body it lived--- Malfoy never would have thought of presenting Hermione Granger to him as a "gift". 

He closed his eyes and felt the tears come. 

A moment later, he felt something soft and feathery slide around his shoulders: Esmé, more generous with touch than he'd been to her. "You have hurt your sssssstudentsssss before, when it wassss necessssary." 

"Not like this." His voice was barely more than a breath. "The worst I ever said in class--- the harshest criticism, the most biting remark--- was kindness itself by comparison." 

Esmé didn't understand, couldn't understand; yet a moment later, he felt the feathery coils squeeze his shoulders in a serpentine hug. "Ssssshe issss young, and you have ssssaid ssssshe isssss intelligent," she said. "And you--- you with your honor---- you will help her." 

He laughed weakly, the quetxal's unflinching and absolute faith in him, her absurd simplification of what was likely to be an agonizing task, bringing him close to hysteria. "It's--- not that simple, featherbrain." 

She butted her head under his chin, then coiled about him silently for a moment. "I think I would like to meet thissssss sssstudent," she said finally. 

The thought of Esmé and Hermione in the same room made him smile. "All right, then," he said, nodding slightly--- then pushed at the feathered coils around his shoulder. "Now, off you go--- I need to get dressed." 

Esmé's coils tightened around his shoulders one last time, then she slithered backwards along the chains. 

As he got out of the tub and dried himself off, Snape reflected on the other reason he kept Esmé. 

It was very nice to have a creature around who didn't mind hugging him.   
  


*****   
  


_Author's note: Esmé was inspired by my own punning sense of humor... but the notion to give her to Snape came to me courtesy of Salome, Snape's snake, in "A Decoding of The Heart"._ _Sphinx is the goddess of Snape/Hermione fic--- again, go, read, enjoy! GRIN _


	9. Chapter 8: Setting the Trap

  
  


Chapter 8. Setting Up the Attack   
  


After lunch, Hermione decided that now was as good a time as any to start researching the house-elves--- and besides, a trek to the library on the first day of vacation would almost certainly get rid of Ron at least and probably all three of the others, leaving her with a little peace. 

_And a chance to see Snape, _insinuated a corner of her mind, which she chose to ignore. 

"I'm going to the library," she announced brightly as they headed out of the Great Hall. "See you in a bit---" 

"Sure," said Ginny easily, seeming to understand. But to Hermione's surprise, neither of the boys made their usual exclamations of disgust. Instead, they exchanged a very odd sort of look, then Ron said--- reluctantly to her ears--- "We'll come with you." 

"Er--- yeah, never too early to get to work, right?" Harry added. 

Hermione looked from one to the other, her eyes narrowed. "Since when do _either_ of you even _think_ about your homework before Christmas?" she asked. 

"Er--- I guess you must be rubbing off on us," Ron said, shooting Harry what could only be described as a pleading glance. 

"Yeah--- and we have a lot more work this year, besides," Harry added. "The O.W.L.s are coming up---" 

But it didn't take a genius to figure out that their sudden enthusiasm for their work had nothing to do with O.W.L.s. "You're--- body-guarding me, is that it?" she demanded, and had the satisfaction of seeing the guilty, startled looks on both male faces. "Because of what happened last night." 

The boys looked at each other again, then Ron said sheepishly, "Well, like McGonagall said, you'd had a rough time---" 

"We just figured you wouldn't want to be alone, that's all, and we didn't think you'd like to ask---" Harry said. 

Hermione couldn't decide whether to be touched or vexed by their reactions. "Honestly---" Her first instinct was to chase them off--- 

_Wait_, said a little voice in her head. _Would you want to throw them off if you _didn't_ want to sneak off to see... Snape?_

And she had to admit that the voice had a point. 

"Well, all right, you two," she said ruefully. "You can tag along after me if you want--- though you'll probably bore yourselves stiff, as my current plan involves spending most of break in the library." 

Harry and Ron's faces were studies in mixed emotions: they looked as though they couldn't decided whether to be relieved or annoyed. "Well," said Harry brightly, "if we start getting really bored, we can always take turns, can't we?" 

For some reason the thought of being alone with Ron bothered her--- but, strangely, not with Harry. _Why is that?_ But she only laughed. "Well, then, come along, my gallant knights," she teased, and they trooped gamely after her to the library, with Ginny in their wake.   
  
  
  
  
  


******   
  


After flashing her prefect's badge at Madam Pince, Hermione made straight for the Restricted Section, causing Harry and Ron--- again--- to exchange looks. 

Ron opened his mouth, but before he could speak, they were intercepted by the formidable librarian. "Fourth years not allowed back there!" she exclaimed, practically collaring Ginny, then turning a sharp gaze on the boys. "And I'm sure you two are up to no good---" 

"Please, Madam Pince," Hermione interceded--- she was one of the few students the librarian actually liked, as they shared a love of the printed word. "They're with me, all three of them---" 

Madam Pince sniffed. "Well, I suppose I can let the fifth years in," she said, "but you, Miss Weasley, will have to find some other mischief to keep you occupied--- or, heaven forbid, actually study." 

Hermione shot her a sympathetic glance as Madam Pince trooped her off, then set off for the Restricted Section. 

"What d'you want back here?" Ron whispered. 

"Right--- we haven't got any assignments that call for it---" Harry paused. "You haven't even got your course books with you---" 

She grinned, feeling a little hint of mischief as she anticipated the boys' reactions to her next bombshell. "It's not schoolwork," she said, "well--- not technically---" 

"Not technically?" Ron repeated, scratching his head. "How d'you mean?" 

"It's something professor Snape gave me the idea for last night---" she said airily, as she began searching the rows of Restricted books for something on house-elves. 

"Snape!" Ron forgot to whisper, and she and Harry both shushed him, lest Madam Pince hear them. He lowered his voice, still looking furious. "After what--- after you---" 

Hermione gave him a severe look. "Actually, Ron, it was the best thing he could do for me--- give me something---" her voice shook all on its own, no acting needed--- "else to think about." She managed a grin. "Besides, I think you'll like this project--- both of you." 

Ron looked mutinous, Harry merely skeptical. "What is it?" the latter asked. 

"Well, somehow he'd found out about S.P.E.W.---" 

Ron snorted--- then looked embarrassed, torn between his dislike of Snape and his disdain for her elf-rights project. 

"And he suggested that I go and look up the origins of house-elves before I went about campaigning for their rights." She couldn't fight a sheepish grin. "Actually he told me that originally they were... how'd he put it---" she tried to remember his exact words--- "'they weren't nearly as nice as goblins, nor as magically weak as a phoenix.'" she shot Ron an arch look. "That make you think better of him--- talking me out of the house-elf rights campaign?" 

Ron again looked torn, but Harry spluttered. "Leave it to Snape," he said, "to manage it." He blinked. "So--- if the elves were all that bad, how'd they turn into---" 

"Winky," snorted Ron. 

"That's what I'm _supposed _to be looking up," Hermione said with some asperity. "So, _if_ the two of you wouldn't mind---" 

"We'll _help_," said Ron, a little too eagerly, and Harry nodded, grinning at her. 

"All right," she said, "but mind you don't open any of the books--- I'm the only one who's supposed to have access, and Madam Pince will throw us out if the silly things start screaming."   
  


*****   
  


In the next week, they quickly reached an unspoken truce: mornings the boys spent in the library helping Hermione with her research, afternoons they either played in the snow or lounged around the Gryffindor common room, Hermione reading and the boys playing chess or getting up to mischief with Ginny. 

Though even Ron had to admit that the history of house-elves was at least somewhat interesting--- and to Hermione, downright fascinating. Most of the books on it were secondary sources, as the transformation had come about sometime before the Middle Ages--- she was having trouble pinning down the exact dates--- but it was very clear that the creatures from which the house-elves had come were absolutely terrifying. Stories of bizarre assaults, willful destruction of breakable items like buildings, and other kinds of violence were rampant. 

Harry wasn't surprised. "If you'd had Dobby trying to 'help' you," he said dryly, "you wouldn't be either." 

Remembering the countless "helpful" incidents that Dobby had perpetrated on Harry in their second year, Hermione couldn't help but laugh. 

"But why didn't anyone do something about them sooner?" Ron asked, puzzled, as they sat one morning poring over a particularly gruesome tale of bloodshed. 

"Because," said Hermione, looking up from the book to pull another one over in front of them--- "they were harmless little imps until they started interbreeding with djinn--- honestly, Ron, with your brother over in Egypt, I'd think you'd know---" 

Ron looked annoyed. "I don't see why---" 

"Because djinn guard treasure, for one thing," said Harry, sticking up for her, which was unusual--- it was usually the boys against Hermione when it came to anything having to do with studying. She guessed it was just one more little way of "cheering her up." 

"And then their natural predators couldn't keep up with them," Hermione said, "so there as a population explosion---" 

Ron shuddered. "Just what you'd want," he muttered, "a bloody mess of those things---" 

"Exactly. Now," said Hermione, returning to the books, "I'd just like to know how they were changed...." 

Snape's words came back to her: _some of my father's ancestors were involved--- along with a few of the Potter family.... _She rather thought Harry would like to know something about his ancestors--- but they weren't in any of the books _she _was finding. 

Well, she'd have to ask him--- _when_ Harry and Ron finally left her alone. 

It had taken them until Christmas Eve to reach that dead end; as Ron said loudly, it was a good thing, for he didn't plan to spend Christmas Day in the library. The afternoon and evening were spent in excited anticipation of the Christmas feast the next day--- even Hermione, with everything she had on her mind, couldn't help but look forward to Christmas dinner at Hogwarts. 

And to seeing Snape. He hadn't been at meals when she and the boys had--- but most of the holiday meals, with the exception of the feast, were quite informal, with everyone wandering in at their leisure. But surely he'd be there for the Christmas feast, wouldn't he? He had been their third year, when the school was almost as deserted as it was this year.... 

Hermione, of course, kept _that_ thought to herself. She didn't want to spoil Harry and Ron's anticipation of the feast. 

But it was the last thought she had before going to sleep that night.   
  


*****   
  


Christmas morning, Hermione awoke to Crookshanks' weight on her chest and a loud purring in her ears--- to say nothing of a cold, wet nose on hers. 

"Merry Christmas to you too, furball," she said affectionately, rolling over and hugging the cat to her chest. He purred even louder--- Crookshanks being quite a cuddler by feline standards, as least where she was concerned. She sat up and looked at the pile of presents on the end of her bed. "And what have we got here, d'you think?" 

There was the usual heap of presents from her parents, a mixture of things Muggle and magical--- mostly books, on spells and science; Hermione liked trying to reconcile the two. And she knew her parents wanted her to keep some contact with her roots, even as they encouraged her to find her place in her new world. Well, the balancing act was about to get harder.... 

There were also the usual thank-you gifts, mostly little tokens from Zonko's ("Goodness, why would I _want_ an exploding quill?" she asked, and Crookshanks sneezed) and Honeydukes, from the younger students she tutored, and Neville Longbottom, who was only passing most of his classes because she helped him. And there was a set of books on the magical potential of cats for her and a set of magical fake mice that scampered about under a Wriggle-Legs Hex for Crookshanks, both from Professor Arabella Figg, this year's Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher, who shared Hermione's love of cats. The venerable witch had invited Hermione to her office to meet all five of hers, and had been most impressed with Crookshanks, whom she pronounced to be half-Kneazle, which excited Hermione no end--- a real wizarding pet! 

From Harry and Ron were the usual boxes of Honeydukes candy--- though she noticed that Ron's had more of the look of "--- and flowers" to it than she really wanted to handle at the moment. This suspicion was confirmed by her present from Mrs. Weasley--- in addition to the usual baked goods, there was her very first Weasley sweater, in a lovely shade of periwinkle blue. "Oh, dear," she said to Crookshanks. "This doesn't look good." Not that she didn't like Ron--- but she really wasn't up to an... escalation, not just now. 

But the package at the bottom of the pile pushed all other thoughts out of her head very quickly. It was a small squashy thing, wrapped in plain dark green paper so thick it was almost cloth, with a Gladrags seal on it. There was no card attached. 

"Who can this be from?" she asked Crookshanks, holding it out for him to sniff. The cat, who had an amazing nose for trouble, having found out Peter Pettigrew in their third year, could probably tell her more about it than any spell--- and after recent events, she was feeling quite cautious about unknown packages. 

Crookshanks dutifully whuffled the parcel--- and purred loudly. "Well, if you say so," she said ruefully, and broke the seal, carefully pulling away the wrapping. 

Something soft and silky, like a handful of moonbeams, puddled out into her hands--- along with two rolls of parchment. One had the Gladrags seal on it, the other was sealed with a crest she didn't recognize: a feathered serpent coiled around a quill. She tried to break the seal, but it wouldn't break. 

"Hmmmm." Whoever had sent her this clearly wanted to create a bit of a puzzle--- which in its way was a present in itself. 

But only a bit of a puzzle--- after a moment she remembered that some seals could only be broken by the addressee. She pressed her thumb to it, and the little parchment rolled open.   
  


"I thought you might find a good use for this. Rather a superior model to the one Potter has from his father--- (there was a large dark blot after that, suggesting words crossed out by the writer). But then, you have more need of it. I think I need not tell you to keep this a secret--- from everyone except the Headmaster, from whom I believe this place _has_ no secrets."   
  


It was signed, "S.S." 

Hermione caught her breath, running her hands over the silvery folds. "Oh---" An Invisibility Cloak of her very own--- better than Harry's, according to.... 

_Severus._ It was the first time she'd called him by his given name in her thoughts--- even when she'd said his name down in the Potions classroom, she hadn't really thought of him that way. 

But she couldn't not, not after... _this_. Because this was not only a gift whose generosity bordered on philanthropy... but a _thoughtful_ present (how else could she slip down to see him?) and one that reflected his trust in her--- that she wouldn't use it for mere mischief. 

Not for the first time, she thought, _He's treating me like a grown woman._

For a moment she could only hold tight to the cloak and blink back tears that startled her; then with a wrench, she set the parchment aside, carefully rerolling it. As she suspected, the seal re-stuck to the parchment, holding it shut. She hesitated for a moment, then slipped it under her pillow, caught up her wand from the bedside table, and murmured a Freezing Charm to hold it in place. The house-elves would be able to move it when they did laundry--- after reading in detail about their powers, she was sure of that!--- but they'd know enough to put it back where they found it and ask no questions. And she didn't want anyone else finding it by mistake--- the memory of Lockhart's card under her pillow could still embarrass her (not least because she hadn't seen through that lying twit herself). 

"Well, let's see what this thing can do," she said to Crookshanks, who was purring happily and snuffling the cloak. She picked up the Gladrags scroll, unrolled it, and started to read. 

And got another shock. It wasn't just an Invisibility Cloak--- it was a Concealment Cloak. Not only did it make the wearer invisible, like Harry's cloak--- it made them inaudible (unless they pulled down the hood) and even somewhat intangible: you couldn't slide through walls or anything big and solid, but you could move through crowds without jostling anyone, or through spaces just a little too small. 

She had to grin at that, remembering some of her research into physics. _Wonder if the wizarding world has found a way around Heisenberg?_ It would certainly explain Apparation, as well as this cloak.... Which was probably not anything she could ask... Severus... about. Somehow, she doubted he'd ever studied any of the Muggle equivalents of magic. But Professor Vector had... now that had promise.... 

Besides those large improvements on Harry's cloak, there were dozens of small ones: the clasps that adhered around your face and body, so that there was no danger of the cloak slipping off as Harry's had done at least once; the climate-control lining; the Exaudio Charm that let you make yourself heard by a specific person if you chose.... Hermione read through the manual (well, it was, even if it was odd to think of a manual for a piece of clothing!) at first with wonder and delight... then with a growing feeling of alarm, even guilt. This would have cost a fortune... and somehow, she just didn't think Snape's salary as a teacher (even at Hogwarts, which had to be one of the more luxurious schools in existence) would cover too many extravagances like this.... 

But he'd been a Slytherin, hadn't he? She'd never heard of a Slytherin who wasn't wealthy.... But then why was he teaching here, if his family had money? And his mother taught at Durmstrang.... 

This was getting complicated. 

But before she could finished puzzling it out, she heard footsteps outside her door, and then a knock--- "Merry Christmas, Hermione!" called three voices from outside her door. 

"Hold on a moment--- I'm in a state of dishabille!" Hermione called, hastily folding the cloak around the manual and sliding it under her pillow, then grabbing her dressing gown as she got to her feet. "'Speak friend and enter.'" 

To her surprise, it was Ginny who got the quote--- her high voice chimed out, "'Mellon'!" and then all three of her friends had piled into the room. 

"I didn't know you'd read Tolkien," she said to younger girl as Harry and Ron started exclaiming sarcastically over the books. 

Ginny grinned. "Muggle Studies--- I'm doing an independent project on Muggles' understanding of magic, remember---" 

Hermione could have kicked herself--- but before she could apologize, Ron noticed the sweater, and insisted she wear it. 

Harry seemed to notice her twitch. "Now we've all got one---" 

"One big happy family!" said Ginny (whose sweater was a very pretty red that somehow went with her red hair instead of clashing as one would expect--- but then, Mrs. Weasley _would_ know what colors looked good on redheads, even if she did get everything Ron owned in maroon). She gave Harry an adoring look... that was the twin of the one Ron was giving Hermione. 

Who swallowed a sigh. _Oh, dear._   
  


*****   
  


The one thing Hermione wanted to do more than any other that Christmas morning was to go down to the dungeons and thank Snape for his gift to her--- but that, alas, was not to be. After breakfast--- at which Snape was conspicuous by his absence, in Hermione's opinion--- Ron and Harry dragged the girls outside for a snowball fight that lasted until almost dinnertime. They dragged themselves upstairs to change--- no one wanted to spoil the Christmas feast by eating it in wet clothing--- and lay about on the chairs and the huge hearthrug in the common room, catching their breaths, until it was time for the feast. 

When they arrived at the dining hall, they found all the House tables pushed against the walls, and a small table in the center of the room. 

Ginny frowned. "What---" 

"This is just like our third year," Harry whispered to her, making her face turn as red as her hair. "When the school's almost empty---" 

He was interrupted by the Headmaster, who entered the room at that moment--- "That's odd," said Ron--- "the teachers always beat us here"--- followed by Professors McGonagall, Sprout, Figg, and--- Hermione's heart skipped a beat, and she sternly told it to behave itself--- Snape, who brought up the rear looking even more sour than usual. "Since we have so few students staying over break--- why, the whole of Ravenclaw and Slytherin are gone---" which explained Flitwick's absence--- "it makes little sense to rattle around at our separate tables at what ought to be a festive occasion." 

Out of the corner of her eye, Hermione saw Ron and Harry glance from Snape to each other, and grin. She could almost hear their thoughts: _"Not likely."_

But the four of them, along with a pair of rather nervous-looking baby Hufflepuffs, settled into seats along with the professors. Professor Sprout, looking even more motherly than usual, settled next to her little charges (who looked quite relieved, and even more so when Ginny, shooting Hermione a wink under her long red bangs, sat on their other side). Harry sat next to Ginny and Ron next to him. McGonagall settled between Sprout and Dumbledore, who gallantly handed Figg into the seat on his other side, between him and Snape. 

Which left Hermione sitting between Ron... and Snape. 

_Oh, dear._

The sudden slight quirk of his eyebrow when he took note of the way the table had sorted itself out somehow settled her--- _he's as startled as I am? _--- and she perched herself next to him, stoutly ignoring the cotillion of butterflies making free of her stomach. 

The look on Professor Dumbledore's face--- just an instant's flicker of his eyes for one to the other of them--- suggested that the seating arrangements were not accidental. Funny; she'd never figured him for cruel. But then, as with most things, he probably had a good reason. 

Hermione didn't notice most of the conversation, or even the meal itself; she was too busy being aware of Snape's presence to her left, the subtle warmth of his body and the tingling all down her arm and side. Though she decided after a minute that sitting next to him was better than sitting anywhere else--- this way she could avoid the temptation to look at him, or the shock of catching sight of him unexpectedly when she turned to speak to someone else. 

Maybe that was why he'd been missing meals.... 

She was so caught up in her half-articulate reverie that Professor Figg had to say her name twice to get her attention. "Er--- yes, Professor Figg?" 

"I just wanted to ask what you thought of my Christmas present," she said dryly, "though if it was that bad---" 

Hermione wrenched her mind back to the Real World. "Oh, the books are wonderful!" she replied, looking up at the old witch--- and trying not to let her voice hitch at the glance she got of Snape, out of the corner of her eye. "And Crookshanks loves his mice--- fake," she added for the benefit of the little Hufflepuffs, who were looking horrified. 

Professor McGonagall pursed her lips impatiently. "Arabella," she said, "professors at this school do not single any of their pupils out for special attentions--- it smacks of favoritism---" 

"Oh, put a sock in it, Minnie," grumped Professor Figg, much to everyone's surprise. "I'm hardly one to play favorites---" her eyes suddenly twinkled--- "ask Severus if you don't believe me." 

Snape looked considerably displeased at being dragged into the conversation. He set down his fork--- Hermione noticed with a start that his plate was mostly untouched--- and answered curtly, "True enough---" Some of Hermione's curiosity must have showed on her face, for he added, "Professor Figg was Head of Slytherin when I was a student here." 

Hermione shot a glance at Harry, who'd dropped his fork onto a plate with a slight clatter muffled, thankfully, by the turkey. Professor Figg had been his neighbor when he lived with the Dursleys--- must be a dreadful shock, discovering that she was Slytherin. He caught Hermione's eye and let his eyebrows fly up into his untidy hair. Sh shrugged minutely. 

McGonagall, meanwhile, shot a piercing look at the two Slytherins. "Oh, I remember---" Hermione wondered at the bitterness in her tone. 

"Then don't complain if I've softened up a bit." Figg resumed dissecting her turkey with the air of one who'd scored a point. 

Hermione exchanged glances with the other Gryffindors. She could almost see the dozen or so questions flitting about their heads, but before she could ask--- 

"You're not usually that slow on the uptake, girl," Professor Figg addressed her in the dry bark that was her usual manner with the students she thought could handle it-- a mark of respect, however backhanded. "Old Crookshanks nabbed your tongue for you?" 

Hermione couldn't suppress a blush, aware of Snape carefully not looking at her. 

Professor Sprout took it on herself to be helpful. "Oh, Arabella," she said in a conspiratorial sort of way, "don't you remember being that age?" 

Professor Figg snorted--- then looked keenly at Hermione, no doubt taking in the blush. "So that's how it is!" she said. "So--- which one of these strapping lads---" she looked from Harry to Ron, who turned as red as his hair--- "has caught your fancy, girl? Or is it someone who's deserted you to return to the bosom of his family for the holidays, eh?" She laughed, a real witch's cackle. 

The reactions at the table were as varied as their owners. Sprout looked mildly surprised, the baby Hufflepuffs dumbfounded. Ginny was trying not to gape and Harry not to laugh, while Ron spluttered. Dumbledore and McGonagall--- the only ones, other than Snape and herself, who knew anything of substance about Hermione's recent experiences--- both looked a little worried, and McGonagall began, "Really, Arabella---" 

But before she could finish, Snape's voice cut through hers like serrated steel. "Don't let Professor Figg's, ah, _bluntness_, distress you, Miss Granger," he said in a dry tone that carried through the hall for all that it was no louder than a whisper--- "She has the distinction of being the only teacher Hogwarts has ever had to show her students less quarter than I--- though perhaps spending the last decade as a Muggle has mellowed her a bit." 

An unpleasant hush followed his words, in which the professors all exchanged an unreadable series of not-quite-glances, with the exception of Snape, who suddenly looked off into the distance. It was as if he'd said something truly nasty, even by his usual standards. 

The silence was broken by the _scrick_ of Snape's chair across the stone floor. "If you'll all excuse me---" 

Dumbledore, who until now had appeared content to let the discussion follow its natural course, looked up from his third helping of turkey. "Must you, Severus?" he asked mildly. "We haven't even started on dessert---" He turned to Professor Figg. "Do help me persuade him, Arabella--- you _were_ his Head of House once, after all." He regarded Professor Figg with a kindly expression that--- from where Hermione was sitting, anyway--- seemed to have more than a hint of steel in it. 

Figg looked away after a moment, up at Snape. "Oh, for Merlin's sake, Severus, sit back down," she said irritably, "or Albus will send us all to bed without dessert." 

Professor McGonagall gave a snort of a laugh--- and Snape, looking mildly irked, resumed his seat. 

"Ah, good," said Dumbledore, rubbing his hands together. "And, as we've all finished our dinners---" he waved his wand, and the dinner dishes were instantly replaced with an assortment of remarkable desserts. 

But while the main course might be finished, Hermione's curiosity was hardly as satisfied as her appetite. _What_ had that business among the professors meant? What was it Snape had said that set everyone off? 

Well, she thought, feeling a little sneaky, she might just be able to ask him--- and actually to get a straight answer from him. 

And she did need to make an opportunity to thank him for the cloak--- in private. Not only had his note said to keep it a secret--- well, if Professor McGonagall didn't like Professor Figg giving her a few books, she shuddered to imagine that formidable woman's reaction to the Concealment Cloak!   
  


*****   
  


The arrival of the desserts served to sweeten everyone mood a little, and it was with a feeling of great contentment that the Gryffindor contingent trooped up the stairs to their tower. 

"Fancy that," said Harry ruefully. "Who'd have guessed--- old Mrs. Figg, Head of Slytherin?" 

"That's practically the same words you said when she turned up as our Dark Arts teacher this year," Hermione reminded him. 

"And you always said she was nasty---" Ron chimed in. 

"No," Harry said thoughtfully. "I mean, aside from shoving pictures of her cats under my nose---" 

"Which she was doing to be nice, Harry," Hermione pointed out. "Some people actually like them." 

"--- and really, her house wasn't that awful, at least, not compared to the Dursleys," Harry finished, ignoring the interruption. 

"Wouldn't anything?" Ron quipped, and the four of them laughed. 

"Well, yes," said Harry, "but that's not the point--- Adeste Fidelis---" he said to the Fat Lady, who swung tipsily open--- she and her friend Vi had been having a bit of a Christmas party for themselves. 

"The point," said Harry, as they settled by the fire, "is that... Professor Figg's just not what you'd expect from a Slytherin, is she? And guarding me all these years--- you'd hardly think---" He trailed off, looking into the fire. 

"Maybe it has something to do with--- whatever the teachers wouldn't say," said Ginny, taking the words right out of Hermione's mouth and startling everyone considerably. 

"What d'you mean?" Ron asked, looking puzzled. 

"Oh, don't be thick, Ron," Hermione said crossly. "Didn't you notice--- the way they all looked at each other, after Snape said what he said about her?" 

"Well, yeah, but I thought that was just because he'd insulted her," Ron said offhandedly. "I mean, really, saying she was meaner than him--- that's _low_." 

Hermione privately disagreed, but she knew Ron wouldn't understand, and she didn't exactly want to explain. Before she could say anything, though, Ginny jumped in, again to everyone's surprise. "It's not just that," she said. "Didn't you notice, the way McGonagall talked to her--- 'I remember---' Like she'd done something awful?" She looked around at the rest--- though she had to rather crane her neck to look at Harry, as she was curled on the hearthrug by his chair. 

"But what?" Hermione wondered. 

But, though they talked about it until all of their remarks were punctuated at random and ungrammatical intervals by yawns, they couldn't find an answer.   
  


*****   
  


It was with a certain amount of relief that Hermione finally made her way up to her room. She was quite sleepy... and there was still one more visit she needed to make.... 

She slipped on the Concealment Cloak--- not only did she have no desire to be caught by Filch, who patrolled the corridors ever at Christmastime, but she _did_ want to try it out... especially on this visit. She rather thought Professor Snape would like to know how much she appreciated his gift. 

The wonder of the cloak drove all sleepiness out of Hermione's mind. The lining was soft, clinging gently to her skin--- and when she closed the last of the neat little fastenings.... 

_She_ didn't feel any different... until she put her hand on the bed. 

For a moment, her hand actually _sunk_ into the surface of the quilt--- then, quite suddenly, came to rest on the top, leaving no indentation to mark its presence, though she could still feel the softness of the down under her palm. 

This was amazing! She was tempted to experiment a little bit more, but she reminded herself sternly that she should get down to the dungeons--- and besides, there would most likely be plenty of chances to try it out on the way. 

She locked her door and slipped downstairs and out through the portrait--- the Fat Lady barely woke, which Hermione supposed was a good thing, as she didn't want her passing remembered. 

The halls, of course, were completely deserted, and Hermione, to her own surprise (and slight disappointment), was able to make her way down to the dungeons without encountering even Mrs. Norris. They were also _cold_, and by the time she reached the corridor outside the Potions classroom, she was very glad of the cloak's climate-control lining. 

She half-expected that his classroom would be deserted--- after all, it _was_ Christmas night--- but no, there was a faint hint of light, though as she drew near she saw that it was under the outside door to his office rather than the classroom. 

She started to knock, then realized that her fist would probably go right through the door, under the cloak at least. She started to slide her hand out from under the soft folds--- when a mischievous thought struck her. Why not test the Exaudio Charm? 

The charm was triggered by a little piece of trimming on the inside of the cloak; after fumbling about for a moment, Hermione found it, and concentrated. "Professor Snape?" 

The effect was quite something; she heard a muffled exclamation--- then silence. 

For a moment, she was afraid the charm had somehow gone wrong--- then she heard the scrape of the door opening--- just a little. 

Gratefully, she slipped through the crack and inside. Snape was standing by the door, looking mildly amused. "Well?" 

"Er--- oh!" She realized that he couldn't tell if she was inside, and she hastily unfastened the cloak. 

The quirk of his lips became more pronounced as she became visible. He shut the door, drew out his wand and tapped what she recognized as a one-way locking sequence: they could leave but no one else could enter. "Trying out your present?" 

"Er--- yes---" Now that she was here, it was suddenly hard to get the words out. The office was dark, she noticed, and cold; the only light came from a single candle on his desk, no fire in the fireplace. She was reminded suddenly and painfully of Dickens. 

"And what do you think of it, eh?" Snape was moving back around his desk. 

"It's wonderful---" she paused, cleared her throat. "And--- that's why I came down here--- I wanted to thank you---" 

He started, freezing for a moment, then continued around his desk to his chair, gestured for her to take a seat. "No thanks needed, child--- it's as convenient for me as for you, as I assume you've figured out." 

"No--- I mean, this had to cost---" The minute the word was out of her mouth, she could have bitten her tongue; one just didn't mention things like money, not about a Christmas present. 

Snape smiled thinly. "I assure you, child, my finances are quite equal to the task." A brief spasm crossed his face--- of what ,exactly, she couldn't say. 

"Er---" At a loss for words, she came to stand behind one of the chairs--- somehow, she just couldn't sit. She settled the soft folds of the cloak over the back of the chair, plucking at them nervously. "And... I wanted to... to wish you a merry Christmas," she managed in a rush, not knowing that she'd wanted to until the words were out of her mouth. 

No mistaking it this time: he started again, and this time she had a glimpse of his face--- astonished, he looked, and bewildered, and rather grateful. The look was gone as soon as it arrived, but it had lingered long enough to touch her. "That's... very kind of you, child," he said quietly. "And a merry Christmas to you as well--- if that's not entirely out of the question." The bitterness in his voice was like a lash, though she sensed it was aimed at himself. 

"Oh, it's not---" she started, then, moved by impulse more than sense, she went around the desk and slipped her arms about him. 

He started, as she'd expected, but then--- also as she'd expected--- his long thin arms came around her and he rested his cheek against the top of her head. 

This wasn't like the other night, when she'd been terrified and hurting and had needed very much to be comforted. She'd gone to him for shelter and he'd offered it--- it had been for her. This was something different, warm and peaceful and... somehow... a kind of sharing. And there was plenty of time, a great deal of luxury, to realize that she liked the feel of his lean body, the ropy muscles in his back under her hands, the deep steady pounding of his heart as she rested her ear against his chest, the warm strength of his arms around her and the gentle stroking of his hands through her hair. She realized, with something of a start, that this was another gift, as unexpected as the cloak and even more welcome. 

As if in answer to her thought, she heard his voice, muffled in the tangle of her hair. "Thank you, Hermione." Slight hoarseness, slight quiver in his voice; she had the oddest thought that he might be crying. "This is the best Christmas present I've received in many, many years." 

She shivered a little in his arms, thinking, _How sad._ How sad, that something as simple as a hug could mean that much to him. 

After a moment, though, he released her, with a gentle pat on her shoulder--- how, _how_ could he be so kind now? She hardly knew him for the professor who scowled at her entire House for three hours straight once a week!--- and stepped back slightly. 

Awkward moment, then--- and for the first time a question niggled at the back of her mind: what _were_ they to each other? Not quite partners and equals, not quite teacher and student--- limbo. Something still shaking itself into place. 

"Well?" She jumped at the sharpness in his voice. "If you only came to extend your holiday felicitations---" 

It took a moment for her to recover, to rationalize. _He has to do this. The eighth square, remember?_ But it still hurt. 

"Actually," she said, not quite able to keep the tremor from her voice, "I wanted to see--- to see if you were still willing to let me look at your books on the origin of house-elves." She hadn't been thinking any such thing, of course--- but it was an awfully good retort, even if she hadn't managed it without stammering. 

For a moment, his stern sneer flickered in the candlelight--- and she started, for a different reason this time: had she actually scored a point in a duel of words with _Snape?_ Then the sneer twisted into a wry thin smile. "Very good, child." He turned back to her, slightly, cupping her cheek in his hand for just a heartbeat, then drawing back. "But next time, _without_ the hesitation, yes? Make it sound like you meant it all along--- that's the point." 

Merlin's teeth, she was getting lessons in sarcasm from Professor Snape! Well, who better to teach her? "You're assuming I didn't." 

Again, that flicker in his eyes--- but the smile deepened. "Oh, I may regret teaching you, that I truly might." He raised an eyebrow. "In that case---" 

He brushed past her, moving into the shadows, while she waited; she thought she heard a door open and close, but couldn't be certain. In any event, it was quite a while before he returned, holding several heavy old books and a couple of rolls of parchment on top of the stack. 

"Here you are, then," he said. "The collected works of my many-times great-aunt Esmeralda the Transformer." 

Hermione blinked, all thoughts of the eighth square or her confused relationship with the Potions Master vanishing as if Apparated. "Esmeralda the Transformer? She's your _aunt_?" 

"Many generations back, yes." His lips curled slightly. "Or is it the fact that I have a family at all--- that I wasn't, as Sirius Black used to accuse me, hatched out of an egg like a basilisk?" 

The sarcasm in his voice stung her--- but the hurt glittering in dark eyes, almost hidden in the shadows, did far worse. "I--- I don't think that---" and, on impulse--- "and really, I didn't just come down here for these---" she gestured at the books. 

His expression was inscrutable in the darkness; then it melted, and he set his burden on the desk and came toward her, into the light. "As your teacher," he said didactically, "I should very well take you to task for allowing your defense, your verbal smokescreen, to falter, much less at so little provocation." She opened her mouth; he held up a finger, silencing her. "But it appears such harshness is impossible, even for me--- which fact," he added dryly, "I must ask that you not bandy about among your fellow Gryffindors, or I'll lose all control of my classroom." 

"Somehow I doubt that," she answered, the wry words slipping out before she could censor them. 

"You're too kind." The wry smile melted into something pensive and solemn. "Too kind by half---" The upraised finger came forward, tapped her lightly on the cheek, then before she could respond, he added, "And since I've gone to the trouble of bringing these---" a graceful gesture at the books--- "for your perusal---" he swept a hand at the two chairs beside the fire--- "shall we peruse them?" 

"I--- oh, yes---" The rest of Hermione's reply, unfortunately, was smothered by a yawn. Now that the assorted excitements of this little visit were wearing off, she remembered just how tired she'd been a few hours ago. 

"Or not," Snape said dryly, then at her half-uttered protest, "Come, child, the books will keep--- they're certainly not going to disappear between now and tomorrow morning, are they? Or even---" a hint of smile, almost conspiratorial--- "tomorrow night?" 

She blinked slightly at that, then nodded. "Er--- no." 

"And you'll be better able to appreciate them rested--- at which time I will insist on your full attention. If you're going to study my great-aunt's magnum opus, you should give it the proper respect." His hand was gentle on her shoulder, guiding her inexorably toward the door. She went, unresisting, a little startled at the speed of the shift, but rather guiltily relieved not to be handed any further complications. 

On her way past the chairs, she caught up her Concealment Cloak from the one nearest the door, and caught a hint of his approving look at her deft movement. She slipped it on over her shoulders, but did not--- yet--- fasten it. 

At the door, he paused, turned so that they faced one another. "Good night, Hermione. And a merry Christmas to you." 

She swallowed at the earnestness in his eyes, and the sincere warmth, and again felt that disorienting question--- what were they to each other? 

"And... and to you... Severus." She couldn't--- quite--- meet his eyes as she said his name. 

But it seemed all right; at any rate, she saw him smile out of the corner of her eye--- then his hands were on her shoulders, gently drawing the hood of the cloak up over her head. Automatically, her hands went to the fastenings--- they brushed with his as he drew back, sending a flurry of sparks through her bones. 

A moment's silence, not quite as awkward as before, then he drew back, rested a hand on the door. "Off you go, then." Gentle tone, and light, as he opened it enough to let her out. 

She slipped under his arm and through the crack between door and wall--- then turned back. 

But, again, the door was already closed. 


	10. Chapter 9: Bishop and Pawn

Author's Notes: First off, thanks to the wonderful people who reviewed this. It's so nice to be loved.... GRIN 

Esmé isn't based on anything in Terry Prachett, because I've never read Terry Prachett--- but I'm perfectly glad to have been told that he too has "feather boas". GRIN And likewise about Esmé's namesake in the Burgess Meredith movie. 

And to those who asked about Snape's choice of endearment for Hermione.... Innocent look Let's just say I'm not letting that one ride, and neither is Hermione. GRIN 

The new material in this chapter is dedicated to J. Odell, who asked about house-elves. The "leaps of understanding" that Esmeralda had made in her working notes are another Screaming _Cyteen_Reference: Ari Emory Sr. makes them too. :    
  
  
  


Chapter 9: Bishop and Pawn   
  
  
  


The very next night, Snape settled rather glumly into the chair at his desk--- hoping against hope, but not really expecting that she'd want to visit again so soon. Well, his office was as good a place to read as his room--- though Esmé did complain about being left to herself. The latest issue of _Ars Alchemica_ would have to suffice for company. 

But, a few minutes before midnight, he was startled out of his reading by a soft voice in his ear. "Professor Snape?" 

He jumped, dropping the roll of parchment. Dear Merlin! He'd never known the Exaudio Charm to replicate the same... _sensual_... effect that a whisper had! But her voice in his ear sent shivers down his spine. 

He got control of himself after a second, reached for his wand and with a gesture unlocked the door. "Come in, Miss Granger--- subtly, if you please; we don't need Filch mistaking you for Peeves." 

Little riff of startled laughter in his ear; a second later, the door opened a crack, as if swaying on its hinges, then swayed shut. And after another second, Hermione Granger's head appeared, floating in midair. 

"Was that subtle enough?" she asked, with that oddly breathless mixture of shyness and cheek that he was beginning to find... endearing. Merlin help them both. 

He got to his feet. "It will do." Coming around the desk, he moved to stand before her, reached out to her. "May I?" 

Not a pro forma question, either--- she was entitled to the courtesy... if she'd consider it so. 

She started slightly--- then that cheeky little blush came back. "Well--- if you can find the clasp." 

He raised an eyebrow in salute to the riposte. "Excellent point." She unfastened the cloak herself, and with the slipping of the last frogged closure, it shimmered into visibility: a diaphanous waterfall of light. 

A moment's hesitation; he held out his hands again. She looked up at him, the blush mounting--- then her chin came up and she leaned toward him slightly, let him take the cloak from her shoulders. He let his hands brush against her collarbone, very lightly and nothing indecent or even seductive. A test, rather, to see what she'd make of this kind of touch--- social, but distinctly charged with an awareness of the difference between the sexes--- from him. 

She twitched slightly... than, somewhat to his consternation, leaned into it, not quite as a grown woman might have--- but not the action of an innocent either. Not what he'd expected--- more fright, more reserve certainly. He couldn't imagine that a few little moments of affectionate closeness could have done half as much for her... as for him. 

But then, perhaps, she wasn't as innocent to begin with as he'd thought. What _had_ she got up to with Viktor Krum? 

The thought actually put a sardonic smile on his face--- certainly, he was in no position to play the jealous lover! 

He took the cloak from her, snapped his fingers sharply--- waited, then again, more impatiently. _Blasted thing...._ Hermione watched him--- not quite quizzically, but with a definite note of curiosity. Well, after four and a half years at Hogwarts, he imagined she ought to be used to the behavior of wizarding implements. 

After a moment, the old iron hatrack in the corner shook itself awake and lumbered painfully out into the room. "Took you long enough," Snape said dryly. The hatrack dipped in a clumsy sort of half-bow before lifting the cloak from his hands with one of its hooks and shambling back into the shadows. 

"It doesn't see much use," he said with deliberate casualness--- as Hermione had followed the rack's progress with every evidence of delight. "Seems to have forgotten its literal _raison d'etre_." 

That brought a delighted almost-giggle--- hastily smothered; she looked down, then up at him out of the corner of her eye, clearly embarrassed. 

By a perfectly natural display of youthful delight. He wondered if she'd always been that shy... or if it was his fault. "Laugh, by all means," he reassured her gently. "There's nothing for you to be ashamed of here." 

Awkward pause--- they had, _he_ had, touched on things neither of them wanted to address. Then Hermione asked, "How--- where did you get it? I mean, it doesn't seem like something you'd---" she broke off, blushing again. 

"It seems a rather comical piece of furniture for someone as notoriously humorless as I, no?" 

"I don't think you're humorless---" she interjected--- then her eyes lit with a certain mischief. "It's just your sense of humor tends more toward laughing-at than laughing-with." 

He blinked in surprise... then felt his lips twitch upward in a smile. "That may be the most succinct, to say nothing of diplomatic, description of my particular brand of sarcasm that I've ever heard." 

"I'm not saying it's a bad thing," she said, still with that mischief lurking in her eyes. "Rather useful for crowd control...." 

"Which I sometimes think is the real definition of teaching--- keeping your students _still_ long enough to drive something into their minds." He backtracked. "Present company excepted, of course." 

She blushed--- quite prettily, in point of fact. He looked away hastily, before her voice brought him back. "You still haven't answered my question." 

"You mean the hatrack?" With a slight sweep of his arm, he guided her to the chairs in front of the fireplace. "Like the chess set, another family legacy, though a far less dignified one." 

She perched on one of the chairs--- they weren't the most comfortable pieces of furniture imaginable, nor intended to be, since mostly he inflicted them on students here for punishment. He didn't have visitors of any other sort. He settled back in the other, trying not to wince. 

Awkward pause, then. There really wasn't any logical reason for her to be here... except for the dark logic of the inescapable and artificial bond between them. Not a bond that she at least would have chosen, he was certain, but it was there, nonetheless, and undeniable. 

Her eyes flickered to the desk. "If I've interrupted anything---" 

Looking for a graceful way to leave already. He felt an odd sort of twinge at that thought--- decided to make her work for it, as a queen should be able to. "Nothing urgent--- just a bit of light reading." 

"What?" She looked interested. 

"What was I reading, you mean?" She nodded. Relieved that they'd found--- for the moment--- a safe subject--- he Summoned the journal. 

"_Ars Alchemica!_" Her eyes went wide. "I've only read a few articles from this--- Madam Pomfrey doesn't keep it on hand---" 

"Not worth the cost," he said dryly, "as very few of the students here could read it with anything like comprehension, and even fewer would." He felt his lip twist. "For that matter, most of the teachers couldn't either." 

She looked up from the roll of parchment, her lip twitching. "The Headmaster, of course---" 

"And myself. And probably Minerva--- Professor McGonagall--- _if_, that is, she'd deign to put her mind to any sort of magic involving physical components--- she and Flitwick are both far too impressed with the abstract--- and Themba Vector." 

As he'd expected, Hermione smiled--- it required no great observational power to note that she and the Arithmancy professor were thick as thieves. No bad choice, actually, on either of their parts; certainly, Vector had a sharply analytical intellect that even he was forced to respect... and, he reflected with a twinge, it was perhaps fortunate that Hermione had something of a mother-figure in the wizarding world, given the circumstances. 

Hermione's voice startled him out of his less than pleasant musing. "What about Professor Figg?" 

He couldn't resist a bit of verbal fencing. "What _about _Professor Figg?" 

She blushed, but her lips twitched--- getting comfortable. "Don't you--- well---" 

"Arabella Figg's talents lie elsewhere," he said shortly, then added--- remembering Christmas dinner--- "and I respect them, as she does mine. But alchemy--- indeed, any of what might be called the magical sciences--- is not her field." No, her field was far more personal--- one couldn't say _human_--- than that. 

Hermione looked suddenly very much like a cat sitting between a bowl of cream and a fishbowl. "Er---" 

He raised an eyebrow. 

"I noticed--- last night at dinner--- what---" she looked down at her hands, flustered. "That--- business--- with Professor Figg and Professor McGonagall---" 

So she had noticed. He'd have been surprised if she hadn't. 

The only question was... how exactly to answer her? He decided on misdirection. "What's to ask?" He sat back in his chair. "Professor Figg was Head of Slytherin during my own student days--- and she was, as I said, the harshest teacher in the school." He forced his lips into something like a smile. "Probably because she was a Slytherin, too, when she was here--- wanting to restore the honor of the House and whatnot. If you want to watch any Slytherin with a grounding in House tradition go misty-eyed, just mention the graduating class of 1920--- last time we had both the Head Girl and Head Boy: Arabella Figg and Alastor Moody." 

As he'd hoped, that distracted her completely. "Moody? Mad-Eye Moody... was a Slytherin?" 

"Yes---" He let his voice harden into its usual sarcastic sharpness. "Did you think only Gryffindors could be Aurors, perhaps? That your house alone could serve the light openly?" 

For a moment, she crumpled--- then, and he could almost see her think, _the eighth square_, her head came up. "No," she said, her voice quivering only slightly, but to all other appearances nonchalant, "but I'm rather surprised that a Slytherin--- or even someone pretending to be a Slytherin--- would turn Draco Malfoy into a bouncing ferret." 

He had to laugh at that. "Child, if I thought for a minute I could get away with it, _I'd_ turn Draco Malfoy into a bouncing ferret--- and leave him that way." 

She looked at him for a moment, her eyes brimming over with mirth--- then it spilled out, and she doubled up laughing. 

He restrained himself for a moment... then joined her. It felt good. 

She caught her breath first--- more used to laughter than he--- and asked, "So--- Malfoy's not as much King of Slytherin as he'd like us all to believe?" 

He sobered abruptly at that. "Well... you're partly right... and so is he. Slytherin internal--- politics is the only word for it, even if we are talking about children who still have stuffed animals---" she looked as if she might laugh again--- "are rather convoluted." 

"I don't doubt it." She regarded him with frank curiosity. "But what does that have to do with Professor Figg?" 

He should have know she wouldn't be that easily deterred. Well, much as he hated to do it--- it was time to begin the queen's lessons. He raised an eyebrow, steepled his fingers, and regarded her coldly. "I would think," he said, "that it should be obvious to you--- but if you can't figure it out---" not quite his harshest tone--- he wasn't sure she could bear that yet--- but it would do--- "perhaps you'll want to... reconsider... taking the Pawn's Walk." 

Her eyes had gone wide and round at that little speech, but the mention of the eighth square, as he'd intended, steadied her. "I suppose I haven't... a Slytherin's cunning yet," she admitted, "but I'll work on it." She set aside the issue of _Ars Alchemica_ still sitting in her lap, got to her feet. "Thank you, Professor Snape, for an... interesting evening--- but if you'll excuse me, it seems I have a clue to work out." 

"Running away?" He let his voice crack softly in the chill air, then softened his tone--- deliberate switch, shaking her then calming her--- and added, "Why, you've hardly looked at the journal--- and there are my great-aunt's books upstairs, that you haven't even _asked_ about." 

She hesitated, and he reached out to the desk, recovered the journal, and held it out to her, raising an eyebrow. 

After a second, she took the roll of parchment, with a hand that trembled slightly. He gestured to the chair, with an invitational lift of his eyebrow. Slowly, she sank down. 

"There." He kept his voice soft, got to his feet and came around to stand by her chair "Shall we see what's inside? I believe Astrid Waxweather's piece might interest you; she's working on applications of Muggle science to alchemy, very controversial, of course---" 

As he spoke, he bent over her, looking at the journal in her lap, and rested a hand against her collarbone, his forefinger lying along her neck near the pulse. She was trembling, sweating just a little; her heartbeat was jumping like a wounded thing. 

And so she was. _Damn you, Severus._ For he'd been the one to do it. 

He kept up the line of commentary as she opened the scroll to Waxweather's piece, all the while letting his hand knead her shoulder gently, wordless reassurance... and just a bit of _stimulus_. Hard line to walk, strengthening her while having no choice but to remind her what his touch could do to her. 

At least it didn't seem to upset her; by the time her clever little fingers found the right place in the scroll, her pulse was back to normal. And by the time they'd finished dissecting Waxweather's article, she'd stopped twitching when his voice sharpened into criticism. 

And by the time they'd moved on to Artimidoros Melarian's research results... _he'd_ begun to relax. Even to let himself enjoy the company and the conversation. Hermione's views might be a little naive when it came to human behavior--- but alchemy, like any of the sciences Muggle or magical, was an objective discipline; one could afford a little naivete. And she really was quite impressively bright. He hadn't known that she'd actually been exploring the relationship of magic to science. It had seemed like something a bright young Muggle-born might appreciate, but her understanding of the subject put her well ahead of many of his peers. Though of course, she had the advantage of being unhampered by prejudice. 

He half-expected her to ask how _he_ knew anything on the topic, but either she'd decided not to open herself to further sarcasm, or she took it for granted that any disdain for all things Muggle he might evince as head of Slytherin was part of his disguise. Well, he'd wait and see if she worked up her nerve, or her curiosity, given time. 

He could have let the discussion go on until morning--- really, it was amazing how good it was simply to talk with her, even to watch her steel herself against his harsher moments--- but after an hour, he took the scroll out of her hands with some firmness. "And that, I think," he said finally, "is quite enough for one evening." 

She started. "If--- if you say so." She got to her feet, hesitantly, and he drew back--- then held out the scroll to her. She took it, in some surprise. 

"Feel free to read the rest of it, if you like." 

She got the hint. "Aren't you going to give me an assignment to go with it, then?" 

"Oh, no." He couldn't resist. "After all, if I did that, you'd know what to prepare for." He beckoned to the hat stand, which responded with somewhat more alacrity this time, and held out her cloak to her. "Good night, Miss Granger." 

She slid into the cloak easily, relaxing under his hands--- then stepping neatly away, turning to face him. "Good night, Professor Snape." 

She fastened the clasps on the cloak--- and abruptly, he appeared to be alone in the room. 

A flick of his wand, and the door slid open a fraction. 

A moment later, it closed.   
  
  
  


*****   
  


The next night, she was back, with an impertinent, "Well, you _did_ say I could read your great-aunt's opus, didn't you?" when he made to take her to task. 

"That I did." She smiled, not quite shyly, as he brought the books over to the chairs by the fire. 

"How much did you find out on your own?" 

"Everything--- I think---" Absently, she bit on a curl of hair; charming habit--- and he knew better than to think it childish. Though the notion of this bright little Gryffindor sharing a nervous tick with his mother was rather unsettling. "Except how your great-aunt fits in." 

He nodded. "Great-Aunt Esmeralda went to some lengths to keep people from knowing just how powerful she was--- she was, after all, a Slytherin." 

Hermione frowned. "But I'd have thought---" She bit her lip. 

"You thought that all Slytherins were like Malfoy, flaunting every ounce of influence they have?" His let a hint of sharpness creep into his voice--- _I'm sorry, Hermione_--- it had to be done. "Well, as much as young Master Malfoy would like everyone to think him the archetypal Slytherin, there are those with far more sense." He gestured to the books in front of them. "Read." 

Any other student--- with the possible exception of his cousin's daughter, Blaise Zabini--- would have taken that as an implied punishment. Hermione, however, looked as if someone had handed her the key to Honeydukes' store-room. 

But unlike most youngsters with their treat of choice, she didn't just grab; she looked over the books and rolls of parchment, flipping through each and looking at the labels and indices, frowning slightly in concentration as she did so. He watched her closely, wondering which she'd settle on. 

To his delight, after her first scan, she went without hesitation to the very smallest of the scrolls--- Esmeralda's true working notes, the process she'd used in developing the transformation spell she'd used to develop house-elves. She examined it slowly, biting her lip again. 

"She was quite brilliant, wasn't she?" Hermione asked him after a moment. 

"Of course---" the practiced sarcasm came easily, much to the despair of his conscience. "She was only the most brilliant witch of her day, I'm sure you learned that much in Binns' wretched excuse for a class---" 

To his astonishment, she didn't even appear to notice the sarcasm. "No," she said absently. "I mean--- her working notes--- she makes all these leaps--- here, look where she goes from one spell to the next without anything like a bridge---" She pointed out the place to him in the text, and he nodded. "Only it's obvious that---" she paused again, looking up at him. "To her, they aren't leaps, they're a sequence." 

"Very good, child." He put just a hint of condescension into it, and watched her bristle. 

And added another, purely internal and wholly unreserved, _Very good_ to the first. _Now let's see if you can _use_ that anger---_

"Now, can _you_ make sense of my great-aunt's 'sequence'?" he asked, looking down his nose at her ever so slightly. He could, of course--- no other way for him to check her work--- but he'd had the advantage of almost three decades of studying them. 

_Not to mention the tutelage of one of the most brilliant Dark witches of the century._ For his mother, whatever else she was, _was_ a genius. He'd gotten a double dose of brains, no doubting that. 

_And what is it they say about regression to the mean, Severus? Don't get too confident._

Hermione, oblivious to his mental monologue, was still staring down at the paper, the curl of hair migrating into her mouth again; this time, she yanked it back hastily. So, unlike his mother, she wasn't above curing her nervous twitches--- or else, again unlike Lucretia Andropolous Snape, she didn't feel capable of commanding others' respect despite them. Well, a good thing for a queen to be aware of, at least. 

She broke into his thoughts, looking up at him. "I can try, sir---" 

"'Try'?" he imitated her. "Any fool can 'try'--- I expect that _you_ should succeed." And then--- calculated shift, now that she was tense, to let her relax again--- "And, child," he added mildly, "you _can_ call me Severus, when we're alone--- _if_ you like." 

For a moment, she gaped at him, trembling just slightly--- then she took a deep breath and her chin came up. "All right--- _Severus._" 

Inwardly he exulted--- the pawn moving determinedly toward the eighth square!--- but was careful to show no sign of it on his face. The last thing she needed was to become dependent on his praise, either as emotional sustenance or a guide to her own performance; either way, she'd never become a queen. "Well?" he snapped. 

Biting her lip, Hermione looked down at the parchment. "This is so private, she was writing only for herself--- I'll need to look at some of her other writings---" She reached for one of the other books. Snape noticed with approval that it was one of the more straightforward pieces, a good guide to the Transformer's mind--- 

Even as he brought his hand down sharply on top of it. "You will not," he said quietly. "Use _that_---" he pointed to the parchment in Hermione's lap--- "and that alone." She stared at him--- then her lips tightened. 

"Am I _allowed_ to use scratch paper, at least?" 

He twitched, violently, he couldn't help it: that tone wouldn't have been out of place from Lucretia herself--- 

_Dear Merlin, a woman like my mother. That Muggle psychoanalyst would have a field day. _But at least it meant she was on the right path--- his mother was, in a very real if not a political sense, a queen. _Poor Hermione. At least she's Gryffindor enough not to become a monster. I hope._

"Yes, I suppose---" he Summoned a roll of parchment, a quill, and ink, set them on the table with the books. "Mind you don't get ink on those--- they're valuable." 

"Madam Pince will be happy to vouch for my trustworthiness." And with that crisp comment, she bent to the scroll and her notes. 

After a moment--- again, calculated timing, just the time to shake her up--- he spoke. "If you can't manage it on your own after a bit" he told her gently, "you can look at the other books then--- it's just that it's not a good idea to get into the habit of taking the easy path---" 

And had the satisfaction of watching her eyes flash in fury. "I don't intend to--- _sir._" 

Which comment had ensured, far more than his earlier harshness, that she _would_ solve it on her own. He sat back to watch her. And to curse his own calculated manipulation of her. 

At least his earlier fears that she was Transfiguring herself into a carbon copy of his mother had yet proved groundless, he thought, watching the open enthusiasm and unfeigned pleasure flit over Hermione's face. She was wholly oblivious to anything but her work, wholly absorbed in it, and wholly enraptured by the task. No, not a manipulator... not yet, at least. And if Circe and Merlin were kind, she'd never truly have to be. 

He watched, and noticed without wanting to that she was also quite heartstoppingly beautiful. 

Beautiful, in a way that a brute like Malfoy would never understand, that the crude little boys who had the impertinence to call themselves her friends would never appreciate. Beautiful in her brilliance and her fascination with learning--- most beautiful when engaged in what she did best: learning, study, experimentation. 

_And would I ever have realized it if Malfoy hadn't offered her to me? Am I any better?_

Yes--- because he would _not_ have realized it; because it would not have been his place to do so. Still wasn't, if truth be told, though perhaps at some point she might find it healing to know that he found her breathtaking. It was still too early in the game to judge where the bishop's pawn would find herself. 

He was drawn out of his wretched reverie by the look of dawning comprehension on Hermione's face. He had only a split second to savor the delight in her eyes before that delight was abruptly transfigured--- apt turn of phrase!--- to horror. 

"Oh--- no---" After a moment, Hermione mastered herself, looked up at him. "She didn't--- did she?" 

Snape lip twisted, though he knew full well what Hermione was thinking. "Elaborate." 

Hermione turned slightly in her chair, held out her own notes to him. "The Imperius Curse--- see, where she was using the magic from the djinns--- they're tied to serve their masters through the lamps, only she took that basic aspect of their magical nature and wrapped it around Imperio, so that they'd have to serve a human---" She shook her head. "No, that's not right; it's so that they'd want to serve a human---" 

She sat back, abruptly, in her chair, closing her eyes, one hand pressed to her forehead as if it pained her. And so it mostly likely did--- Severus, having had the same sort of experience himself no few times, could well imagine. "The--- the problem with the imp-djinn crossbreeds--- I found this out in the library--- was that they had all the powers of djinn, and the freedom of the imps. And they got a dose of mischief from both sides of the family tree." He had to smile at that turn of phrase; Hermione, her eyes closed, didn't realize. "Only---" With another sudden movement, she sat up, pointing first to the original parchment, then to her notes--- "they still had some of that djinn--- well, you can hardly call it loyalty, can you?" This time they shared the smile. "But they still had that latent capacity to be tied down to one place or thing--- to serve a master. And, like their djinn ancestors, they _hated_ the idea of servitude--- that's why they were so vile to humans, wasn't it?" 

Snape blinked. _That_ little piece of information was in some of his great-aunt's other writings--- but as far as he knew (and he'd spent a great deal of time in the Restricted Section of the library in his own student days) it wasn't anywhere else that Hermione would have seen. "What makes you say that?" he asked, carefully. 

Hermione actually made an impatient noise; he smothered a smile. "_Because_--- look what she _did_---" again, the gesture from the original to her notes--- "That's why she used Imperio: because it makes the obedience pleasurable---" She looked up on the last word; a mistake. 

For a long moment, they held each other's eyes, not needing to speak, not daring to. Snape drew back first. "Very good, child," he said, keeping his voice carefully neutral. "Excellent work, in point of fact---" He smiled. "You see? You did succeed." 

She caught her breath, leaning back in her own chair, looking more than a little flustered. "Er--- that's why---" she picked up the thread of her spiel with only a little faltering; he encouraged her with a nod to continue. "That's why the house-elves are so deferential, so eager to serve: it feels _good_ to them to make a human happy. And see---" she leaned forward again, parchment in hand--- "that's where Esmeralda twisted the djinn-heritage into the version of Imperio, so that it would be passed down from parents to children---" she looked up, grinning. "Only, like any trait, it doesn't always come in the same strength--- there's a house-elf like Dobby down in the kitchens who's perilously close to being an imp." 

He smiled back at her. "Given that the creature in question once belonged to Lucius Malfoy, I can hardly blame him." 

Hermione looked away at the name--- for only an instant; then, defiantly, back up. "Wonder if we couldn't reverse the spell just on the rest of the Malfoy domestic staff?" 

He couldn't help but join in her almost feral grin. "Now that, child, would be a sight indeed." He gestured at the other books. "It may seem anticlimactic after your little bit of ciphering---" her lip twisted sarcastically at the slight--- "but if you'd like to have a look at the other books---" 

"Please?" Again, that look of a child in a sweetshop that banished any resemblance she might have had to Lucretia. He inclined his head, and she reached out for the book on the top of the pile--- then stopped, biting her lip. "S-Severus?" 

"Yes, child?" 

"Was... Esmeralda the Transformer a Dark witch?" 

"Why do you ask that?" He kept his voice gentle; no time for manipulating, this. 

"Because--- she used one of the Unforgivable Curses---" She looked up at him, wanting answers. 

Answers that she could only find for herself--- _if_ she were going to become a queen. "And why did she use it?" he asked gently--- then held up a hand, forestalling her answer. "Don't tell _me. _Think about it." And, before she could lose herself in the intricacies of the philosophical puzzle he'd set her, he leaned forward, tapped the pile of books. "And in the meantime---" 

Hermione didn't ask him again that night; they were too busy with the what and the how of the Transformer's work to question the why. But several hours later, when a yawning Hermione had finally retrieved her Concealment Cloak, and was headed out the door, she turned to him and said, "Is there any such thing as a 'Dark' witch, or wizard?" 

He smiled. "You're learning." Because that question was the first step--- the first step to abandoning the rigid categories that defined most people's safe moral worlds and learning to make the delicate, difficult judgements that a queen had to accept as second nature. 

The first step; the first square. It was a long journey--- but he began to hope that she might make it. 

"Good night, Hermione." He drew the cloak up over her face. 

And heard her voice in his ear. "Good night, Severus."   
  


******   
  


It became a pattern with them, those late-night knocks on the door and evenings spent in his office poring over a book or journal. She toughened herself to his sarcasm faster than he'd expected; he rather expected she'd backslide a little once the initial "thrill" wore off. But then, he wasn't sure. His own calcifying had been entirely accidental. 

More difficult for him to bear was his own reaction to her presence, the warm scent of her skin, her shy smiles and her sudden bursts of mischief. It was almost too much joy for him to bear, having her there, night after night, seeking out his company. Certainly, more human contact than he normally got in a year. And yet--- he knew, reminded himself constantly, that it was all... artificial. Contrived. And he'd been the contriver, for all that Lucius Malfoy had started this dark game. _His_ hands had done the sweet cruel work of twisting her to his will. She wouldn't have been here but for that. 

No, he couldn't let himself enjoy it too much. That way lay darkness, as he'd learned so many years ago. _No better than the monsters._

But it was far and away the most wonderful, innocent thing he'd done in his adult life. That, at least, was some comfort. And she was enjoying herself--- no reluctance there, except perhaps when, ever so deliberately, he _cut_. Understandable, again. And she understood--- he'd see it in her eyes, after the flash and flicker of hurt. He could see it written there: _the eighth square_. 

Sometimes he wondered if that too wasn't a contrivance, and a possibly dangerous one. To let her focus so completely on a goal that, for all he knew, might be irrelevant--- who was to say that she'd ever again confront the Dark directly? What would she--- they, it was his responsibility--- do for closure then? Even if she did get her dramatic transformation, what about her life afterwards? 

Well, they'd cross that bridge when they came to it. And, who knew--- they might both end up dead before the battle was won, and it would be a moot point entirely. 

In the meantime, there were these moments. Things like joy and peace that he'd never had, and that she seemed to find an unexpected delight, at least here, with him. A mind he could guide--- a truly brilliant intellect, she revealed that with her every breath. Indeed, the raw stuff of her mind seemed to temper under the challenges he offered her. He had recognized her brilliance from her first day in his class--- but with the new, broader, and admittedly more dangerous intellectual world he offered her, he began to see a small but subtle flare of genius. 

An intellect equal to his own. She'd not had the tempering he had received by her age--- but he suspected that the grounding of confidence and safety that she'd obviously known as a child would stand her in good stead now that she met adversity and challenge. He'd faced _only_ the testing, never found the safety. 

But perhaps... he could offer her both. At the very least, he could give her an appreciate platform for her gift--- and provide it with something to strive for. At least, he could care for her, and know that his caring was of value to her. 

That was enough, and more than he'd ever thought to have. 


	11. Chapter 10: A Pair of Pawns

  
  


In the grand tradition of Slytherin Rising, I've decided to create a little challenge to my loyal readers: 

Last evening (10/6/01), I uploaded an edited version of PtQ to ff.net. There are four content changes (two of them on the same topic) in this version (not counting any corrections for spelling/punctuation). Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to find the changes! Drop me an email at riley139@yahoo.com when you think you've got me. I will accept it as a "complete" win if you can only find one of the two changes on the same topic, but find the other two. 

And, again in Ms. Matthews' brilliant tradition, the first person to correctly identify all the little edits gets an advance peek at the next chapter! 

I realize it may be arrogant of me to think that anyone has read this beast that carefully, but on the other hand I'd just looooove to reward the memories of anyone who has!   
  


Notes for this chapter: 

Catlin and Florian Teasdale are named for the Catlin and Florian in _Cyteen_, who aren't twins but are definitely partners, not to mention supercool. Blaise and her Pooh Bear are a gestalt of (yet again) _Cyteen_ (in which Ari Junior's "Poo-thing" is a featured player) and #15 in J.L. Matthews' hilarious "Rules of Being a Successful Slytherin". Blaisie is most certainly to be feared.... Padadise Lost is a Milton ref, not one to EbonyJ's "Trouble in Paradise". sigh 

And, while I'm on the subject.... Sometime in the next few chapters I intend to address the issue of wizarding inheritance. Now that Blaise is here, it shouldn't be too long in coming :D so I thought I'd do the note now. Rowlings has said that wizards live longer than Muggles (Dumbledore's about 150 according to her and who would know better? ; ) which means that the usual pattern of children inheriting at their parents' deaths wouldn't work too well. So I cribbed a(nother) notion from _Cyteen_, that of joint property, with parents and their adult-age children holding the family assets in common (the folk in _Cyteen_ also have extended lifespans, thanks to, uh, post-modern medical technology... GRIN). Cherryh doesn't go into it at any length, though, so I'm mostly on my own except for the concept itself. Robert Heinlein probably addresses that issue somewhere in his "Lazarus Long" books, but I don't remember it specifically. And speaking of Heinlein, the "Lazy [Wo]Man Who Couldn't Fail" is his, from _Time Enough For Love_.   
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


Chapter 10: A Pair of Pawns   
  


All too soon, classes started up again and the school was once again swarming with students. 

Snape, knowing imminent disaster when it stared him in the face, took steps to head it off. The evening before classes resumed, he called Draco Malfoy into his office. 

His normal reaction to the boy's presence was somewhere between distaste and a certain bitter amusement... but tonight he was astonished to feel his stomach actually roil with anger at the sight of Lucius' spawn strutting into his office. 

Draco draped himself over a chair, uninvited, looked up at him with a mixture of his usual sycophancy and--- was that a hint of a sneer? _Turning into his father._ "You wanted to see me, sir?" 

Snape smiled thinly. "That I did, _Mister_ Malfoy, that I did." He got to his feet and came around the desk, leaned against the heavy wood with his arms folded, looking down at little Malfoy... and let the silence build. 

He waited until some of the smugness had ebbed out of the boy's countenance, until Draco regarded him with just a trace of the nervousness most students showed in this office. Then he let the smile widen into something more friendly. "I believe you were responsible for your father's choice of a... Christmas present for me?" 

It took a moment for Lucius' boy to understand--- clearly the son was not the equal of the father (could _he_ take credit for spoiling the boy? Probably not). Then the light dawned... and Draco smiled, callow imitation of his father's smirk. "Did you... like it, sir?" he asked; almost funny to see the boy striving so hard to talk with him man-to-man, to seem worldly-wise and clever and sly. 

"Oh, yes, indeed," he said silkily, leaning forward a tad. "And did your father tell you to what use I intend to put his... present?" Draco's smirk faltered slightly. "No? Then let me enlighten you." He pushed himself up off the desk, clasped his hands behind his back, and began to prowl about Draco's chair with slow thoughtful strides. "This... present... is in a perfect position to be useful to our cause--- I'm sure you understand that?" Conspiratorial smile that the Malfoy-spawn had to look over his shoulder to see. "In fact, if we handle the situation correctly, we can be responsible for the ultimate success of our cause." Speaking obliquely with a brute like Lucius Malfoy's son was difficult--- but it had to be done. One didn't come out and discuss the kind of things that had happened in Lucius Malfoy's dungeon openly. Even if one _was_ the head of Slytherin. 

Dear Draco took the bait--- his father would be _so _disappointed in him. "What--- what are we going to do?" he asked, his eyes alight with a hideous eagerness. 

"For now," Snape said gently, "I am going to do what I need to. And _you_---" he came around so that he and Draco were face-to-face--- "are going to do likewise." He leaned down, resting his hands on the arms of Draco's chair, a posture that could be either intimate or threatening. "Say nothing of this to anyone. Give none of the other teachers a reason to suspect anything, give none of your classmate cause to. In all other respects---" he leaned back again--- "carry on as usual." 

The Malfoy-spawn's smile was conspiratorial. "That's just what Father said." 

Snape inclined his head slightly--- while inside the tight knot in his stomach relaxed. So, his caution made sense, even within his persona as a Death Eater in good standing. "Very good." He stepped back from Draco's chair. "Have a pleasant evening, young man." 

Draco glided to his feet, youthful version of his father. At the door, he paused, the smug smile turned conspiratorial. "You too, sir." 

Snape paused only long enough to unlock the door before bearing down on his desk--- and the drawer that held the bottle of Laphroaig. He needed to wash the foul taste out of his mouth. 

That was one worry out of the way--- little Draco wouldn't put Hermione in a dangerous position. The last thing she needed was more strain on her nerves. 

What she _did_ need, however, was... a friend. What she'd probably needed all along, come to think of it. Someone besides Weasley and Potter, someone trustworthy and as bright as she was... another young woman perhaps. 

And the envelope on his desk from dear cousin Claire suggested a solution.   
  


*****   
  
  
  


Hermione couldn't fight a slight flicker of apprehension as she, Harry, and Ron walked into the Potions classroom together. It wasn't that she was afraid of seeing _Snape_, precisely... but seeing him in a classroom, after everything that had happened, trying to be just another student, trying to treat him as just another teacher. To behave normally, when his voice sent warm shivers up and down her spine and settled a warm lump in her belly.... 

_The eighth square. Think of the eighth square._

Right on cue, Ron's hand found hers--- she had to fight the urge to flinch away. "It's okay, Hermione, you'll be fine." 

_As soon as you let go of me, I will be._ But his little gesture did calm her, if not for the reasons he'd hope. At least she could be around Snape without flinching every time he touched her. 

They took their seats at their usual table in the back of the room; Hermione couldn't help but feel a twinge of guilt. She usually liked to be near the front of a class, and skulking in the back of _his_room seemed now like a betrayal. 

But she forgot all about that as Draco Malfoy walked into the classroom 

_Malfoy._ She hadn't even thought about him--- stupid, stupid. Surely, he'd know what his father and Snape had done? What was he going to say? 

Harry was clearly thinking along the same lines; he leaned over and whispered urgently, "You think Malfoy--- knows?" 

She could only nod shakily, vaguely aware that on her other side Ron was muttering threats, only able to watch Malfoy and his cronies--- _Dear Merlin, he looks like his father_, and felt her stomach roil. 

Malfoy looked at her--- one long look, and her heart plummeted at his little knowing smirk. But he only turned, after a moment, and went to sit between his two goons. 

Harry stared, and Ron asked, "What's his game, I wonder, the git?" 

But Hermione had been doing some quick thinking. "Snape," she whispered. "I don't know how, but Snape must've warned him off me---" 

Both boys looked dubious, but didn't have a chance to respond, for at that moment, the object of their discussion himself swept into the classroom. 

Despite herself, Hermione felt her heart flip over at the sight of him--- never mind she'd spent last evening in his office, discussing the finer points of magical micro-chemistry--- it was still a shock to see him there, as always... when nothing was the same. 

If Snape had any such reaction, he didn't show it--- except perhaps in the slight flicker in his eyes as they passed over her. He glided to the front of the room and started talking about Healing Potions. 

After a few minutes, Hermione managed to recover from the shock of being around him and hearing that silky voice in a normal setting, and chided herself for her inattention. _Some queen you are!_ She even managed to get her hand waving in the air as usual, though her voice might have quavered a little when she explained how a Healing Potion could be misused to cause a very nasty form of cancer--- and did those cold dark eyes warm a little with approval? She wasn't sure. 

By the time they'd broken up into groups to start preparing their Healing Potions, she was almost back to normal. She joined Neville at the back of the room, firmly quashing the sense of resignation she always felt at, well, letting him ride her coattails. 

"Miss Granger." She started at Snape's silky voice, nearly dropped a vial of sea salt as he swooped down upon her. _So much for composure._ "I think Longbottom's had the advantage of your--- expertise--- long enough," he sneered. "Go sit next to Miss Zabini." 

Hermione looked up at him, nervously; the glitter in his eyes gave away nothing. 

_He's got a reason for it, I'm certain._ "Yes, sir." She gathered up her bag and her cauldron. Come to think of it, wasn't Blaise Zabini in her Arithmancy class? You had to have decent scores to stay in that course after your first year of it. And she _had_ wanted a break from Neville.... 

As Hermione came over, Blaise Zabini looked up: a slim, dark-haired girl with a pale face and sharp silvery eyes. "Hello." 

"Hello." Hermione set her things down and began to set up. After a moment, she felt like she should say something. "I hope you don't mind---" 

"What mind? It was Professor Snape's idea. Besides---" the silvery eyes got a mischievous glint--- "bet you're better company than Pansy 'the future Mrs. Draco Malfoy' Parkinson." 

Hermione stared at her. _I guess this must be my year for unexpected bursts of candor from Slytherins._ Blaise continued blithely, "And I'll bet you're not sorry not to have to do Longbottom's work for him either." She shrugged, turning back to her cauldron. 

"Er---" Well, the other girl had been more than honest about her house; didn't she deserve a little candor in return? "Very much so." 

Blaise Zabini looked up at her--- then smiled, a little shyly. 

They worked in companionable silence for a few minutes. Hermione noticed that Blaise's measurements were as precise as her own, even to topping off the scoops of powdered comfrey with the same motion: lift, tap, and swipe. 

The potion called for Mandrake roots; Hermione amused herself imagining the sullen wrinkled little man-shape under her knife as Lucius Malfoy. It was a great deal of fun dismembering him. 

"Who's yours?" The soft uncertain voice made her look up to see Blaise regarding her with interest. They looked awkwardly at each for a moment, then the other girl added hastily, "You'll never guess who mine is." 

"Parkinson?" Hermione hazarded, relieved to be distracted from her own Mandrake's alias. 

"Close." Blaise's pale skin showed blushes all too well; must be awkward, for a Slytherin. 

Hermione couldn't believe the implications. "Not... Malfoy?" 

"Exactly!" Blaise caught the look Hermione gave her. "What--- you think because I'm a Slytherin I've got to fall all over myself to Malfoy?" 

That was too much like... Severus... for words. "No!" The word slipped out of her mouth before she could think. Hastily, she backpedaled. "I mean... don't you all, though?" 

Blaise looked disgusted. "Most of them. It's easier. Unless you know a lot of curses." She bit her lip, as if she thought she'd said too much. 

"And you do?" Maybe it was an effect of everything that had happened to her over Christmas, but an implication that once would have horrified her now only intrigued her. 

"Among other things." Blaise bit her lip again. 

"Like what?" No mistaking the wariness in the other girl's eyes for anything but. "Look, I'm sorry, I'm just curious, and there's so much they don't teach us here--- and," she added mischievously, "anything that scares off Malfoy sounds like a good idea to me." 

For a moment they looked at each other... then burst into giggles. 

"Well," said Blaise when they'd finally managed to stifle their giggles, "it's more a matter of getting a reputation for knowing things, than actually knowing them, if you get my point." She looked sly, suddenly. "And in Slytherin, if you know how to do things without magic, you've won half the battle--- most of the Serpent's Den doesn't think it's possible to do stuff without magic. But half the time, it's not only possible, it's easier." She grinned. "But you'd know that, wouldn't you? You're Muggle-born." 

Hermione blinked, started at hearing a Slytherin admit that there was more to life than wizarding. "I don't know---" 

"Oh, come on." The mischief was dancing in Blaise's eyes. "Half what we do in Potions isn't that much different from Muggle chemistry, is it?" 

Hermione felt her own heart jump with excitement. Someone else interested in the link between science and magic. "No--- I mean, look at what we're doing right now---"   
  


*****   
  
  
  


Snape watched as both the girls bent to the parchment, heads together, talking excitedly. Two like minds--- kindred spirits, really. And Merlin knew his cousin's daughter needed some intellectual companionship. So, for that matter, did Hermione. 

He fought to suppress a smile. _My good deed for the century._   
  
  
  


*****   
  


Hermione felt a rush of sadness when the class ended; she'd hardly noticed the time passing. 

Just like the first night when Snape had her be his assistant. And most of the nights after that. 

Blaise, too, was moving rather slowly to gather up her things. The two of them were the last to leave the classroom. 

At the door, they both stopped, looking at each other awkwardly. "Uh--- 

"See you in Arithmancy?" she asked, and the dark-haired girl grinned. 

"Or the library. I spend most evenings up there---" 

"Avoiding Malfoy?" 

"Right in one---" Blaise glanced at the clock. "Better get going---" She didn't have to be a mind-reader to know that Blaise couldn't let herself get caught hanging around with a Gryffindor. 

"Right." Blaise ducked out the door... leaving Hermione alone in the Potions classroom. With Professor Snape. 

She turned around to find him regarding her, one eyebrow quirking just slightly. 

"Thank you," she said, taking a hesitant step forward. 

The smile he gave her was one she didn't think anyone else had ever seen. "It was my pleasure." His lips twitched with suppressed amusement. "And you'll notice I didn't give you a detention tonight--- so you and Miss Zabini can spend the evening denuding Madam Pomfrey's shelves of everything remotely related to Muggle 'magic.'" 

She felt her own lips lift in response. "Thank you---" Then, hastily, feeling a little bereft, "Can I still---" 

The long-suffering look he acquired was tempered with a certain dry humor. "If Potter can roam about the building anytime he likes in that cloak of his, which he only has courtesy of the Headmaster, then you are more than welcome to use yours to visit one of your teachers, I think." He eyes gentled. "Now--- off with you." 

Hermione couldn't quite get the smile off her face as she ducked out the door.   
  


*****   
  


At the door to the Slytherin common room, Blaise Zabini put her ruminations aside. You didn't go into the Serpents' Den without all your wits about you. 

At least not when you were a Zabini in a Slytherin House infested with a Malfoy. 

"Paradise Lost," she said to the hidden door--- now _there _was an appropriate turn of phrase! Certainly worth the effort she'd had talking the other prefects into using a Muggle-lit quote. 

She squared her shoulders as the wall swung open, tipped her head back just enough for confidence, not enough for challenge. Not that she minded sending Malfoy flying a few yards under the pretext of giving a demonstration of curses for the first years, but tonight she needed time to think. 

Stepping through the doorway, she reconnoitered quickly--- one sweeping glance told her the important things: Malfoy and his cronies had hogged the best chairs by the fire and Pansy Parkinson--- _Circe help us all_--- was sitting _at Draco's feet._

Fighting the urge to drop a scathing remark in their direction, she headed for the stairs to the girls' dorm. The Teasdale twins, Catlin and Florian, glanced up at her from their accustomed shadowy corner; she traded a look of shared disgust with them at Parkinson's behavior. Catlin glanced meaningfully at the stairs and shot her a hopeful look, but Blaise shook her head minutely. Not that she blamed the Teasdales for lurking in her room--- they were third years and didn't really have anywhere else private and safe to go--- but at the moment she needed to think. And Cat and Flor, fun as they were, weren't conducive to thought. 

She continued up the stairs without further delay and reached her bedroom with a mounting feeling of relief that she quickly quashed. Not safe to relax until you were behind a locked door and your own wards. 

Which she accomplished quickly enough, and slumped back against the heavily-hexed door to her bedroom with a sigh. 

The Slytherin prefects got their pick of rooms; even though she was only in fifth year, she had a better room than most of the Sixth Form. Double bed under the rich green velvet hangings, her own fountain tap and the little Zen garden outside what would have been a window aboveground, and enough bookcases to hold most of her personal library. And, as a prefect, she got to keep it for the next two years. Living in a House that rewarded ambition had its perks. 

And having your mum's favorite cousin for Head of House should have... but so far "Cousin" Severus hadn't done much for her. Which, given that she had to survive Malfoy and his cronies, probably wasn't a bad thing. Dear little Draco would undoubtedly have run screaming to his father about nepotism--- meaning, of course, any sort of favoritism that wasn't favoring _him._ No, she'd decided back in first year that the best thing she and her cousin could do for each other was to ignore their family connection and even each other as much as humanly possible. 

Until today. This was the first time in five years that Professor Snape had singled her out in any way at all... and it had been to put her with a Gryffindor Muggle-born who should have been her very own sister. Very interesting. 

Blaise pushed herself off the door and headed for the walk-in closet, one of the few amenities that was wasted on her. She preferred to have a small but elegant wardrobe, unlike the Parkinson twit, who bought everything Gladrags put out so long as it cost enough to feed a small family for a week. Blaise's own tastes went to the high end of Madam Malkin's understated brilliance, and a few Muggle designers. There were advantages to being born into a hybrid-fortune family. 

Also--- she couldn't suppress a smug smile--- to certain more basic biological inheritances. She stripped off her school robes and studied herself in the mirror. _Got the best of both worlds, Blaisie-love, no doubting that._ She had her mother's slenderness and pale skin, her father's midnight-black hair and just enough roundness from the Italian side of the family to leave no doubt of her femininity. And Mum swore that one of her Weldon-Rhyst great-grandmothers had been a veela--- which Blaise had to admit was at least remotely possible. The pale skin she shared with her mother was flawless on both faces; they didn't have a bad angle to their bone structures. 

The perfect face looking at her in the mirror frowned. _Fat lot of good it does me, in bloody Slytherin._ Not a male of eligible age in the house she'd want anything to do with, and she could only hope that Malfoy's fanaticism about purity of blood would outweigh the occasional half-conscious leers he kept sending her way, before he remembered himself and turned back to Parkinson. 

_Huh. Maybe I should see if I can't enlist dear Pansy's help in keeping Draco's roving eyes--- and whatever--- firmly on her._

And maybe, just maybe, there was the possibility of an alliance somewhere else entirely. 

Blaise grabbed her dressing gown and headed for the bed--- her favorite thinking spot. The feather mattress cuddled up around her like a hug, the best thing possible for tense nerves, after a hot bath and brandy (the latter of which wasn't supposed to be available to her here. _Hmph._) But the bed was almost as good and what it held was better. 

She reached under the covered and pulled out an old, much-hugged rag of teddy bear. "Hullo, Pooh." Winnie-_ther_-Pooh (as Christopher Robin had called him) looked back at her with his faded button eyes; even her mother's best Preservation Charms could only do so much for a stuffed animal that she'd had in her crib. 

She smiled sardonically to herself as she remember the other Slytherins' reactions to Pooh Bear. When she'd pulled him out of her trunk the first night at Hogwarts, Parkinson had nearly got a hernia laughing. "You take _that_ to bed with you?" 

And Blaise, tutored by her mother in the twin arts of observation and verbal mayhem, had retorted, without batting an eye, "Better than cozying up to a Malfoy, love--- at least this fellow keeps his grubby paws to himself." 

Just for spite, she'd brought Pooh to the common room with her for a week running, settling him next to her in her chair while she worked. If nothing else, it had given her a chance to show off the curses she knew. Not to mention that by the end of her first week, some of the third years were asking her for help with their lessons. The privilege of brains. Actually, she hadn't gotten too much hazing about old Pooh. Anyone in Slytherin who'd have a stuffed toy and not hide it had to have something up their sleeve. 

_Enough gloating about past triumphs, Blaise. _She tucked the ragged bear against her chest, curled up on the bed, and settled in for some serious thought. 

What _was_ Cousin Severus playing at? She'd watched with interest as he'd given the Granger girl detentions every day for six weeks running--- not that it was unusual for him to abuse the Gryffindors (and quite amusing to watch the logical contortions he put himself through to find a pretext), but he hadn't taken a single point off the House after the first day. Just those detentions. 

Almost, she'd begun to think, quite against her will, that Malfoy was right, him and his little girlfriend. Maybe their Head of House really _did_ have other uses for a bright little Gryffindor. 

Except that the bright little Gryffindor hadn't shown any sign that she was being abused--- and there wasn't a Gryffindor born who could dissemble _that_ well. And as a Slytherin prefect, Blaise knew how to recognize the signs.... 

She cut off that line of thought in a hurry. Her parents' money and power and her own status as a prefect should be enough to keep most of the scum at bay. And if all else failed... well, Malfoy _did_have a nice voice; he'd make a wonderful castrato. 

All of which wasn't getting her any closer to resolving this little mystery. She tightened her grip on Pooh, frowning. 

Truth to tell, she wouldn't have cared less what her mum's cousin wanted with a Gryffindor--- except that today he'd brought _her_ into the game. Sitting her and Granger together. 

Blaise felt a smile twitch her lips in spite of herself. It really had been the nicest class she'd had in a while. Someone to talk to, about something more interesting than marriage and makeup, for goodness' sakes! And Granger shared her enthusiasm for the combination of science and magic--- not really surprising given that she was a Muggle-born, but it wasn't something that _Blaise_ got to talk about much, not living in Slytherin. 

"Hmph." Maybe _that_ was it. Occam's Razor and least complex hypothesis. In the course of all those detentions, Snape had somehow found out that Granger was into Muggle-magic--- wait. That could be what the detentions were about in the first place. Cousin Severus was from a hybrid-fortune family too--- not that the Andropolous side would have exactly encouraged Sebastian Snape's dabbling in Muggle investments, but there was no reason Blaise's great-uncle couldn't have passed that interest on to his son. And here at Hogwarts, Cousin Severus would be free to pursue any experiments he wanted to in that line. He must have needed an assistant--- and one who could freely work with Muggle things. 

_Then why didn't he ask me?_ She couldn't suppress the sullen twinge. The Zabini family had, after all, made its fortune off the black market trade between Muggles and wizards--- the Prohibition Principle, her father called it, and had made her read up on that period of American history. And her mother snuck the _Godfather_ movies into the house and they giggled about how much her dad _did_ look like Al Pacino. ("Why else would I have married him?" "Besides the money and power, y'mean, Mum?") And there was no question she was as bright as Granger--- 

_Yeah, Zabini, but not as driven._ She grinned ruefully to herself. The Lazy Woman Who Couldn't Fail, that was Blaise. Bright enough not to have to work for _good_ marks, and only to exert herself a little for top marks. Which left her plenty of time for more important things--- like money. The Hogwarts curriculum was the best in the wizarding world when it came to magic as such, but in things like high finance it was woefully deficient. 

Which meant that a bright little Slyth-witch with a head for numbers had to learn the markets on her own time. Most of her free hours were spent poring over the _Gringotts Journal_--- biased little pureblood parchment that it was--- and Muggle finance periodicals. To say nothing of the more interesting private papers that a Slytherin could get her hands on if she was clever. Her housemates talked too much about their families' money for her not to do some quick figuring of her own. 

And she'd bet anything that Cousin Severus knew it. Maybe that was why he'd asked Granger instead. _Too lazy by half, Zabini, and enough on your plate. Come on, he was being _nice_ to you._

And maybe that was why he'd paired her up with Granger. Two bright little witches with interests in common. Likely friends, except they were in rival houses. And maybe--- she couldn't help but grin--- Professor Snape was hoping Hermione would be a good influence on his cousin's lazy offspring. 

Yep, Occam's Razor sliced it up that way. All perfectly innocent. Nothing to worry about, love. Dive right in and have a blast with another nerd-witch. 

Except that in Slytherin House, Occam's Razor was often only useful for slitting your own wrists. 

But for the life of her, she couldn't figure out what his game was.... 

She was interrupted in her ruminations by twin knocks on the door. _In more than one sense._"Speak friend and enter." 

"Mellon," said two voices, and in a moment, two near-identical heads poked in the door. "Is it all right---" began Catlin--- 

"---if we come in now---" added her brother--- 

"We know you're busy---" 

"--- but Malfoy was being---" 

"---his usual self---" 

"---and we couldn't take any more." 

Blaise grinned in spite of herself. "How it's possible," she said ruefully, "for a pair of fraternal twins--- boy and girl, to boot--- to look so exactly alike, I'll never know." And indeed they did: both had the same thick silky chestnut brown hair, worn shoulder length and tied back, the same long Roman nose and bright green eyes, the same bone structure--- they were even the same height. Flor was skinny for a boy, and Cat, despite entering into puberty over the summer, still looked boyish enough under her voluminous Hogwarts robes to pass for her brother's twin. Or he for hers. 

The twins grinned at her. "Long practice---" Flor. 

"--- plus the hope that we'll confuse someone badly enough---" 

"Wouldn't you like to see Malfoy's face--- 

"--- if he tried to put a hand---" 

"---somewhere private on my sister---" 

"And got Flor instead?" Catlin chortled wickedly. 

"Or Parkinson, for that matter--- she wouldn't like getting another girl---" 

"Only she's fixed on Malfoy, the stupid cow---" 

"Why anyone would _want_ him--- 

"Well, not every girl has anything else to recommend her---" 

"--- like brains, for instance---" 

"But honestly! She's a disgrace to Slyth-witches, wouldn't you say, Blaise?" Catlin looked up at her hopefully. 

"I certainly would." Blaise gestured for them to sit, and they did, curling up on the cushions beside the hearth. "Of course," she couldn't resist adding playfully, "she'd say the same about us." 

"Oh, for Merlin's sake!" The twins scoffed in unison. "Why she wouldn't know a disgrace--- 

"If one walloped her on her rump---" 

"Not that that wouldn't be a treat to see---" 

"But really, a Death Eater's daughter, calling _us_ a disgrace---" 

"Because our family's _sensible_ about money---" 

"And just because those inbred idiots can't compete in a wider market---" 

"Is no reason to discriminate---" 

"Not that there's _ever_ a reason to discriminate, brother---" Catlin looked at him sternly. 

"Is there some reason I need to be here for this conversation?" Blaise interrupted mildly. 

Cat and Flor looked at each other for a moment, then turned back to her. In unison: "Not really." 

Blaise laughed and leaned back on the bed. The Teasdales were some of her favorite people: another hybrid family, but of another sort from the Zabini black-market empire. Without breaking or even bending any laws, the Teasdale clan had managed to hold on simultaneously to a Muggle industrial concern and a thriving business in wizarding equipment. To say nothing of their investments on both sides of the Invisible Curtain (as Blaise's father called it)_._

And this generation had produced Claudia Teasdale, the last Slytherin Head Girl, former Chudley Cannons Seeker, current Auror--- and Blaise's hero. The twins found this highly amusing, but they nonetheless gave her regular updates on her idol. _And_ she could talk money with them, in pounds as well as Galleons. And Flor wasn't unattractive, not by half--- in two years, when he was eligible for the Slytherin Mating Frenzy.... 

Blaise cut that line of thought off in a hurry. She set aside Pooh and came over to join them at the hearth. 

Catlin glanced from her to the bed. "You had Pooh out---" 

"What's up?" Both twins looked at her inquiringly. Though they didn't know how much of a thinking aid the bear was to her, they both understood the value of comfort objects--- both of them had come to the Great all their first day with stuffed basilisks tucked under their arms. A politic choice: there wasn't a Slytherin in the place who'd make fun of _that_ animal. 

"Not much... just... thinking." 

"What about?" Catlin leaned forward, a mixture of curiosity and concern. 

"Something funny happened in Potions today---" She told them how Snape had put Granger next to her, wincing inwardly at her own _most_ un-Slytherin candor. But, after all, they were bound to hear about it, and it was more to her advantage if they heard it from her. 

To say nothing of the fact that they were both sharp as little tacks, even if they were two years her junior. Both Teasdales listened attentively as Blaise finished--- "so I don't know what his game is, much less what my next move should be." Galling thing to admit--- but he was, after all, a teacher. 

The twins both frowned, then assumed identical versions of the famous "Thinker" pose, elbow on knee and chin in hand. "Well---" began Cat--- 

"There could be some funny business---" 

"Then why would he pair Granger with---" Catlin frowned at her brother---- 

"A Slytherin prefect, I know." Florian leaned back. "So it's not---" 

"Hanky-panky. Something above-board?" 

"He's a Slytherin, Cat, come on---" 

"So are we, and so's Claws---" Their eldest sister's school nickname--- "and so's Moody---" 

"And they wouldn't be so good at what they did---" 

"If they weren't snakes in the grass, I know. But even Slytherins---" Catlin grinned--- "have off days--- and human sides." A flicker like the sudden bursting to life of a lightbulb (Blaise's family integrated Muggle technology and magic, rather seamlessly, in their homes) flashed across Cat's face. "Wait--- you think it could be---" 

"Well, they are both a lot like Claws, aren't they?" Florian had clearly caught on to his sister's brainwave--- no surprise there, the Teasdale twins gave every impression of being able to read each other's minds. 

"And like him, if Claws was right---" Cat looked over at Blaise. "Look, it's simple--- you and Granger are the brightest stars in your houses---" 

"Which is Claudia, and Professor Snape, all over again, and she---" 

"Paired off with Bill Weasley, he still comes to the house for holidays---" 

"Anyway, Snape's probably just identifying with the pair of you---" 

"And remembering Claudia." 

"Wait--- your sister was in school with Snape?" This was one thing she hadn't wormed out of them. 

"Her first year was his last---" 

"And her seventh year was his first as a teacher." 

"The alpha and the omega," Blaise said dryly. Then, "You think that's really all it is?" It was reassuring to have the Occam's Razor-cut given the Teasdale stamp of approval--- but they were only third years. 

"Of course," said Florian brightly, "He could be planning---" 

"For you to sabotage her chances for being Head Girl---" Catlin frowned. "But Flor, he's---" 

"I know, that generation can still remember when Slytherin could win the House Cup fair and square." 

Cat grinned over at her, with an embarrassed sort of shrug. "Well, that's all _we_ can come up with, at any rate---" 

"Sorry we weren't more help---" Florian looked genuinely distressed. 

Blaise couldn't help but grin at them. "Nah, you do all right--- was thinking the same think myself." And grinned again as their faces lit up at the implied compliment--- much as hers did when they compared her to their sister. The thought was rather touching. 

The clock on the wall chimed. "Blimey---" 

"It's nearly dinner---" Catlin got to her feet, dragging Florian along with her. "And we haven't---" 

"Hardly started on our homework--- that git Malfoy---" 

"Was making such a pest of himself---" 

Blaise felt her lip twist with shared distaste. "Well, take your books to dinner and we'll head for the library---" she grinned conspiratorially--- "I all but told Granger I'd meet her there; might do her some good to meet a few more Slyths who aren't Muggle-haters." 

Both twins grinned. "Charming Gryffindors---" 

"Is a family specialty---" And with that, they swept out the door. 

Blaise grinned. One couldn't help feeling better after a chat with the Teasdale twins--- just watching the high-speed ping-pong match they called small talk was enough to make anyone smile. And truth to tell, she wouldn't mind getting their read on Granger. Too bad they weren't in her year. 

Because Blaise just couldn't shake the notion that Cousin Severus was Up To Something. 

He was, after all, a Slytherin. 


	12. Chapter 11: Pawns at Play

  
  
  
  


A/N: Well, here we are again! More Blaise-and-twins, more Esmé--- and I am ROFL about the Pratchett links! WHHEEEE! That is way too weird, especially given that I _don't_ fancy myself a humorist...   
  


And I would like to announce the winner of the PtQ contest: Lacy aka CloakedStoat.   
  


The edits were, in her words:   
  
  
  


1a and 1b) At the beginning of their conversation in the carriage (Chapter 3: The White King), Snape does not immediately call her "child" but begins with "sweet," -- Herimione's reaction is visibly negative, and he amends to "child" before continuing his initial address. 

Later, when he is reflecting on the use of an endearment on her (Chapter 5: A Bishop Alone), he thinks to himself about how she had reacted to "Sweet" just before musing on why he is calling her Child.   
  


2) In Chapter 1: Opening Moves, the notation of the Malfoy home as being located in France -- and corresponding commentary about the French Ministry being less vigilent in the watch for the Dark then is the English.   
  


3) And in Chapter 8: Setting The Trap, the comment that when Prof. Figg had met Crookshanks, not only had she been "most impressed" with Crookshanks, but she had also pronounced him "half Kneazle." (A real wizarding pet to be sure!)   
  


The runner up is Proserpina Lethe, who got all of them but misplaced the "double ref"--- and didn't beat Lacy.   
  


The other contestants: Rosmerta (with one point, for catching the "sweet" change) and Emma (with two, for the new location of Chateau Malfoy--- thanks to vanguard my beta, who wondered why the Malfoys had a Chateau instead of a manor!).   
  


Annotations:   
  


Now that the contest is over, I can properly annotate one of my references. Snape's calling Hermione "sweet" in Ch. 3 is a direct link to C.J. Cherryh's Cyteen--- it's Ari Emory Sr.'s favorite endearment. (Those of you who have read _Cyteen_ will recognize that this is, um, thematic. GRIN)   
  


In this chapter: 

Things equaling the same thing but not equaling each other is from Robert Heinlein's _The Number of the Beast._   
  
  
  


Chapter 11: Pawns at Play   
  


Hermione wasn't exactly surprised when Harry and Ron decided to tag along to the library with her. And, frankly, after seeing Malfoy and being reminded forcibly that she'd have to face him day in and day out for the next two terms, she was just as glad to have the support. 

"So, what are you looking for, anyway?" Ron asked as they headed down the stairs. "You said you hadn't got that much homework--- more house-elf stuff?" 

"Oh---" Until that moment, Hermione hadn't actually thought of a pretext. _Stupid, Granger--- _not_ going to help you get to the eighth square!_ "Just random rummaging--- Blaise Zabini and I were talking about ways to combine science and magic, and I wanted to see if the library had anything on it." 

"What, you mean you don't know every book in there by heart?" Ron jibed, but Harry was looking thoughtful. 

"A Slytherin--- knowing about Muggle stuff?" He frowning, sending his glasses sliding down his nose. 

"Yeah--- there's a couple Slytherin families like that," Ron said, offhand. "Like the Teasdales--- Bill was seeing one of them for a while, dunno what happened with that---" he shrugged. 

"But isn't that odd, seeing as how they're all into purity of blood and everything?" Harry clearly felt like he was onto something. "And there's Snape pairing you with one," he continued. "Five years, and he only dumped you with a Slytherin that one time, after that Skeeter cow's article in _Witch Weekly_--- and then it was Parkinson." 

Hermione wrinkled her nose at the memory--- then smothered a laugh at her memory of Blaise's description of the other girl. "Not fun---" 

"But today, he up and puts you with a Slytherin--- and one who knows about Muggle stuff." 

Ron frowned. "That is odd. Sounds like he was trying to be---" he looked dubious--- "_nice_." 

"Oh, for pity's sake---" Hermione stopped dead in her tracks. "Do I really have to spell it out for you?" 

Apparently she did, as both boys gave her baffled looks. She sighed, resumed walking. "Well, if you can't think of a reason why Snape mightn't want to do me a good turn after this holiday, I'm certainly not going to help you." 

The scurrying sound of both boys hurrying to catch up was rather gratifying. Though her pleasure was somewhat dimmed by Ron's next words. "Can't see how you can just up and trust him---" 

She opened her mouth to reply, but what would have become a heated--- to say nothing of potentially risky--- argument was forestalled by their arrival at the library doors. 

Hermione wasn't in the least surprised--- to say nothing of pleased--- to find Blaise Zabini ensconced at a table in the back. It was a surprise, however, to see that she had two of her housemates with her. Hermione wasn't sure what Ron and Harry were going to make of this--- though she was suddenly very glad of the company. Three Slytherins, two of them unknown quantities, was two too many. 

Blaise looked up as they came over--- and the beginnings of a friendly smile faded as she took in Hermione's companions. "'Lo, Granger," she said cheerily enough, but her eyes still lingered cautiously on the boys. Hermione, with a sudden flash of insight, wondered if some Slytherins might not be as wary of Gryffindors as the reverse--- and if some of _her_ housemates might not have given them reason. You didn't want to get on the wrong side of Fred and George Weasley, just to name two.... 

"Hullo, Zabini," she answered, feeling decidedly awkward. Where friends were concerned, things equal to the same thing were _not_ necessarily equal to each other--- even if she were friends with both Blaise and the boys, it mightn't mean that they could be friends with each other. 

She took a look at Blaise's companions: twins, though she couldn't tell if they were boys or girls, and a year or two younger than she. They took in her companions with interested eyes that were rather less wary than Blaise's. Well, they _were_ younger, and not having Malfoy in your year might make you a little friendlier toward other houses. 

There was an awkward pause, which Hermione decided to break by keeping up the pretense she'd started with Harry and Ron. "Don't suppose you'd know if there were any books on mixing magic with science around here---" 

She got no further than that before the twins' faces lit up. "Oh, you're into that too?" said one. 

"Well, there's nothing in the library on it---" the second twin's voice was a little deeper. 

"We looked all first year, but honestly---" 

"This library is so orthodox---" 

"We had to get all our books sent from home---" 

"And of course Blaise---" the twin sitting nearest her leaned a little toward the older girl, then away--- 

"Has a great collection on that sort of thing---" 

Hermione looked from one to the other of them, trying not to gape--- or laugh. Definitely the Wimbledon of verbal tennis. 

Blaise broke in, the silver eyes twinkling. "These two---" she nodded at the twins--- "are Catlin---" she gestured at the twin farthest from her--- "and Florian Teasdale." 

"Er---" Harry was looking from one to the other again, clearly trying to make sense of the names--- at least as much as Hermione was. 

"Boy---" said Florian, holding up his hand. 

"And girl," Catlin finished, holding hers out to a very surprised Harry, who took it, blinking. The twins grinned up at him in a way that said they planned for that reaction. 

"Teasdale?" To everyone's surprise, it was Ron who spoke up--- but then, hadn't he been talking about the Teasdales in the hallway? "You're Claudia Teasdale's sibs, are you?" 

The twins exchanged glances. "Yes---" said Florian. "Which makes you--- 

"Ron Weasley, Bill's brother." Catlin was looking up at him with interest. "And Charlie's, too--- Claws says it's a dead shame--- 

"That he didn't go on and play Quidditch, but then---" 

"She can't really talk---" 

"But she played for the Cannons!" Ron was looking very interested indeed now; quite as if he'd forgotten he was talking to Slytherins. There was an empty seat by Catlin and he stepped over to it--- though, to Hermione's surprise, he waited politely for Catlin's nod before plunking himself into the chair. "Best Seeker they ever had---" 

"Until that scum of a Beater for the Falmouth Falcons knocked her off her broom, she was!" This was clearly a subject near and dear to Catlin Teasdale's heart. 

Florian apparently wasn't as moved by his sister's plight; he grinned as he said, "After which she decided to pursue a career as an Auror--- says it's a sight safer---" 

Catlin glared at her brother. "When I'm old enough---" 

"If you ever get to play for the house team, with that git Malfoy buying his way---" 

"Well, he's two years ahead of us, isn't he?" Catlin turned to her brother. "They'll need a Seeker when he graduates---" 

"You're a Seeker?" Now Harry joined the Quidditch-chat. 

Catlin looked up at him, blushing slightly. "Er---" 

"Don't be shy about it, Cat," her brother egged her on--- then a mischievous grin spread across his face. "Claws knocked Charlie Weasley arse-over-teakettle in a pickup game once, and Bill still took her to the Graduation Ball---" 

Hermione turned to Ron in alarm, wondering how he'd take that, but he only chuckled. "Charlie told me about that," he said. "Reckons he should've known better than to play Aussie-rules Quidditch with a Slytherin." 

"What's 'Aussie-rules'?" Harry asked, and as one the three Cannons fans turned to him and were off on a description of the finer points of the sport--- the basic philosophy of which was apparently, "If it's not lethal, it's legal"--- before you could say, "Golden Snitch". 

Hermione, feeling a little lost, looked up to find Blaise regarding her with rueful amusement. The dark-haired girl gestured with a jerk of her head for Hermione to sit on her other side, turning away from the Quidditch discussion as Hermione came round the table. 

"They'll be at it for hours," Blaise said wryly. "They're both on the reserves--- could've been on the first team as Chasers, but Catlin wants to try for Seeker, so her brother's lagging along for fellowship's sake---" Her lips quirked as Hermione felt her own eyes start to glaze over. "All of which I only know because they tell me, in great detail, about the trials and tribulations of being on the Slytherin Quidditch team with a Malfoy in residence." A flicker of something darker crossed Blaise's face. "About like being in the House with him...." 

Hermione felt the need to say something. "Never thought I'd see the day when a Slytherin admitted to not liking Malfoy." 

Blaise grinned sheepishly, a lock of her long hair falling into her face. She pushed it back behind her ear. "There's more of us than you think--- Teasdales and Malfoys positively _loathe_ one another!" She gestured at the twins. "As Cat and Flor implied, their family's quite heavily into Muggle science--- they've got themselves a factory or six as well as their wizarding businesses." Her grin turned conspiratorial. "My dad's always trying to get them to start developing hybrid technology, but they're too cautious of British law--- damn Fudge anyway." 

This was a bit much for Hermione to take in all at once. "So your family's got Muggle interests as well?" 

"You could say that." The Slytherin's face took on a dodgy look. "Nothing compared to the Teasdales, though," she added hastily. "We're all wizards, but half of Cat and Flor's sibs went to Muggle schools--- think they've got a brother at Eton." 

"Gerald," said Florian, half-turning so that he included himself in both conversations. "And we've got sibs in three of the four Hogwarts houses--- not a Hufflepuff in the bunch," he added with perhaps pardonable pride--- "but other than that, we could have our own little race for the House Cup if we wanted." 

"Could anyway," Blaise said snidely. "When's Hufflepuff ever won it?" 

Hermione shifted uncomfortably in her seat. For a bit, she'd forgotten that this lot were Slytherins, with all the nastiness that implied, but now the knowledge came back to her full force. "Er---" 

Blaise looked back at her, and the unpleasant hardness crumbled from her face. "Meaning no offense," she added hastily, "and Circe knows Diggory was a credit to the House---" 

She broke off as Harry looked up suddenly, his face ashen. "What is it?" Catlin asked, surprised. 

"Er--- nothing--- you were saying---?" He turned back to her with every evidence of attention; Florian, with a shrug at the older girls, returned to the Quidditch discussion. 

Hermione, however, exchanged a quick glance with Ron. She wasn't the only one who'd been having a hard year. Ever since they'd come back a number of people had been making a point of blaming Harry for Cedric Diggory's death. Despite the fact that it was Lord Voldemort's doing, many of their schoolmates felt that Harry had somehow put him in the line of fire. As if they all weren't in harm's way, just being here at Hogwarts, with Voldemort on the rise! Hermione sniffed, didn't realize she'd done so until Blaise looked at her oddly. 

"What is it?" The other girl sounded genuinely concerned. 

"Oh, nothing much---" Blaise was a fellow prefect, wasn't she? On impulse, Hermione decided to tell her. "Well, some people--- since the Triwizard Tournament and all--- they've been... blaming Harry---" 

"For---" Blaise lowered her voice. "For Diggory, you mean?" Hermione nodded. Blaise gave a most unladylike snort, out of place from someone who looked like a porcelain statuette given life. "Rubbish! Now, if Potter'd been a Slytherin---" She grinned slyly. "I mean, there's plenty in the house that would stab somebody in the back for a lot less than a thousand Galleons--- you should see what that lot get up to in the common room at night, and me a prefect, trying to break it up!" She broke off at Hermione's appalled expression. "Er--- sorry." For a second, Blaise looked uncomfortable, then she grinned. "Though I can't imagine having the Weasley twins is what you'd call peaceful, now, is it?" 

Hermione opened her mouth to say that she wouldn't class Weasley's Wizard Wheezes with backstabbing, then remembered the Ton-Tongue Toffees and thought better of it. "You could say that." 

Blaise grinned, then looked thoughtful of him. "Got to be rough on Potter, though," she said, making the same sort of conversational right-angle bend that usually left Hermione's friends in the dust when _she_ did it. "And him a prefect and all--- undermines his authority somewhat, wouldn't you say?" 

Hermione blinked, startled--- then realized that Blaise was right. Absorbed as she'd been in her friend's emotional response, she hadn't noticed the other. But now that she thought of it, she'd seen the looks he got, the way some of the students didn't move as quickly when he gave a command--- nothing earthshattering, just the simple move-along or break-it-up that all the prefects did. She'd chalked it up to Harry's naturally easygoing manner... but now that Blaise said it, she realized that might just be it. "I never thought of it that way," she said, in response to the questioning look the other girl was giving her (she _had_ been silent a bit, there). "But you're spot-on." 

Blaise grinned ruefully. "Trust a Slytherin to see a power- game." 

"Too right!" Hermione hadn't thought of _that_, either. Feeling suddenly shy, she added, "Nice having one for a friend, though." 

Blaise, to her vast surprise, actually blushed. "Nice having a Gryffindor mate, too---" Then the grin was back. "Someone to talk Muggle-magic with---" she looked over at the other four, still deep in discussion of the finer points of their favorite game--- "who _doesn't_ talk Quidditch." 

Hermione felt herself grinning back. "Speaking of Muggle-magic--- the twins said you had some books---" 

"Yes--- there's not too much out there, but you can find things if you know where to look--- Borgin and Burkes usually has something---" 

"But that's a Dark Arts shop!" Hermione exclaimed before she could stop herself. 

Blaise gave her a Look. "Hermione, according to the existing laws as set down by our dear Minister of Magic---" who evidently was _not_ dear to Blaise, any more than to Hermione and the boys--- "dabbling in mixing magic and science borders on the Dark Arts too." 

Hermione rearranged her face into something less horrified--- then a thought struck her. "That's odd." 

"What is?" 

"Well... I'd got used to thinking of the Dark Arts as something that got used on Muggles by the prejudiced sort of pureblood," she said thoughtfully. "But it sounds like it works the other way too--- the prejudiced sort can call anything involving cooperation between wizards and Muggles 'Dark Arts', too, if they want." 

Blaise was grinning at her admiringly. "Too right!" she said. "Why, some of the things I have in my library are perfectly innocent, except they deal with magic as one of the sciences, or several---" 

Which set them off on a discussion of reading material that lasted until Madam Pince closed the library. 

*****   
  
  
  


Back in the Gryffindor common room, Hermione announced that she was going to study for the OWLs. Meeting with the expected resistance from the boys--- "What? They're not for another four months!" exclaimed Ron, as if it were four years--- she gracefully made her exit to her own room... where she congratulated herself on her cleverness. 

Not that studying for the OWLs wasn't a very good idea--- but she had a shrewd suspicion that Blaise would be more than happy to be her study partner, most likely a better one than either of the boys. And this was the perfect opportunity to slip down and see Snape. 

She pulled on the Concealment Cloak and slipped through the common room to hover by the door, wondering idly if there was any way to get in and out that didn't involve waiting for someone else to open the portrait for her. Maybe if she found a way to bribe the Fat Lady--- 

She grinned at her own thoughts. _Already thinking like a Slytherin, aren't you, Granger? Maybe Blaise'll have some ideas---_ At which point the portrait swung open to admit a gaggle of first years, and Hermione gratefully slipped out in their wake. 

The door to his classroom was just the slightest bit open, though his office door was closed. She used the Exaudio Charm to whisper in his ear, and a moment later, the door swung open. 

Snape was at his desk, apparently grading papers. "Good evening, Miss Granger," he said, getting to his feet as she slid the cloak off her face and began undoing the fastenings. "I trust you and Miss Zabini had a productive evening the library?" The slightest of smiles played around his lips. 

She felt herself blushing a little. "Well, not exactly," she said, and at his raised eyebrow added, "But it was interesting." The eyebrow went higher. "She brought the Teasdale twins along with her---" 

"Ah." The eyebrow resumed its normal angle, and a slight smile played about the corners of his mouth. "I assume they regaled you with tales of their famous sibling?" 

"That they did--- well, actually, they talked Quidditch with Ron and Harry---" the eyebrow went back up. "Er... they took it into their heads to keep me company, ever since Christmas." 

"How very chivalric of them." It wasn't _quite_ a sneer. "I suppose it's too much to hope that they've actually joined you in making use of the library for its intended purpose, rather than hovering about you as Crabbe and Goyle do Malfoy?" 

Hermione smothered her flinch at that name. "Well, they did help me a bit in researching house-elves---" she smothered a giggle. "I think you quite brought Ron around, what with getting me off house-elf rights." 

Again, Snape's lip twitched. "Not that Weasley's good opinion matters in the least to me, but perhaps it will keep him from disrupting class in the future--- or is that too much to hope for?" 

"I'm afraid so." She undid the last fastenings on the cloak and he took it from her gently, called up the hat-rack--- which was now moving with some alacrity, having gotten a bit of a workout in the last week--- and hung it up for her. "I don't suppose Miss Weasley accompanied you and your 'honor guard'?" 

Hermione looked up at him, surprised. _First Ginny takes it as a given that Snape's a double agent, now he's asking after her. What _is_ this?_ "No--- why do you ask?" 

Something flickered in his eyes for a moment, then he shrugged slightly. "In the first place, the young lady had a rather unpleasant experience her first year---" _Understating a little, aren't you, sir?_--- "and I'd rather hoped that her brother, at least, would have the decency to watch out for her." He half-sneered. 

"Usually, I do, but--- well, frankly I wasn't sure how well Ron would take to my meeting up with a Slytherin, and didn't want Ginny in the crossfire." _and who are you trying to convince, Granger--- him or yourself? _Think_ about your friends the next time, for goodness' sakes!_

Again he smiled slightly. "Funny, that, given that his older brother and Claudia Teasdale were the most prominent couple in their year." 

"That's what Ron said---" she did a double-take. "How did you know?" 

He chuckled. "Because, child, the eldest Miss Teasdale's last year as a student here was my first year as the Head of Slytherin." The smile widened. "And frankly, I couldn't have managed without her--- she was Head Girl, and had rather something of a gift for winning the confidence of the younger students. And, as you can imagine, the year after Voldemort's downfall was a particularly difficult time to be a Slytherin." 

"Yes, I can," Hermione said, the pain in his voice distracting her from the unexpected pang of jealousy she felt at hearing Snape so casually admitting to relying on someone else--- on another woman. "How well did you know her?" she asked, before she could stop herself. "I mean, she is famous," she added lamely. 

From the look on Snape's face, he'd seen right through her attempt at dissembling. "Well enough, I suppose," he shrugged. "Her first year as a student was my last--- I spent rather a bit of time keeping her out of harm's way, which was to say Sirius Black's way---" At her surprised look, his lips twisted, his eyes glittering unpleasantly. "Oh yes, child, it hasn't always been poor, honest Gryffindors made sport of by conniving Slytherins--- though I'll confess that with a Malfoy in the house, you have some justice in thinking so." The bitter look in his eyes reminded her forcibly of the night in the Shrieking Shack. "But sometimes, child, it's bullying Gryffindors setting on innocent Slytherins--- Slytherins younger than they, in fact." 

"Younger?" The question slipped out before she could stop; she cursed herself. _He means Teasdale, silly---_

"Yes, younger," he said, ignoring what she'd _thought_ was a faux pas. "Black and his cohorts were in the same year as I was, true enough--- but we weren't the same age." 

It took her a moment to sort this out. "You started early then?" She couldn't imagine Sirius and Harry's father having been held back. 

Snape smiled slightly. "Yes. My father's idea---to get me away from my mother, I think---" He looked away, a spasm crossing his face; before she could ask, he shook his head. "I'm most likely boring you again--- and certainly keeping you standing here. Come, let's sit down." 

He drew her over to the chairs by the fire, his hand resting gently on her shoulder with the same affectionate kindness as he'd shown that first night, the friendliness of teacher to student and nothing more. "So, what did you think of Miss Zabini?" 

"She's--- something else." Now that Snape asked, the complexity of her response to her Slytherin year-mate surprised her. "I mean, one moment, it's like we've known each other all our lives, and then the next she says something so--- so--- cold---" Hermione shook her head. "What is she, Severus?" His given name slipped out before she realized it. 

He smiled slightly. "She's a Slytherin, Hermione--- a Slytherin from a very dangerous family." He paused. "The rest of it is Blaise's story to tell you, and I'll let her do it in her own time--- but Hermione, believe me, I'd not have gone out of my way to throw the two of you together if I didn't believe that you can trust her." He smiled slightly. "One thing I will tell you, however, because it's as much my business as hers, is that her mother's my first cousin." At Hermione's startled look, the smile got wider. "We don't bandy it about, of course--- if I showed any sign of favoring another student over Malfoy, he'd go straight to his father--- and, of course, as a Death Eater in good standing---" he sneered--- "I could hardly be expected to favor a family that dabbles in Muggle technology and society." 

"Hardly---" She grinned. "Not even one of your own bloodline? 

He shrugged. "Everyone in Slytherin House is related, child--- it's just a matter of degree." He smiled slightly. "There are those who say it's not a proper Slytherin gathering if everyone in the room isn't somehow related to everyone else. Makes marriages difficult, I can tell you." 

Hermione looked up at him. "Then why bother looking after your cousin?" 

Snape reached out, took Hermione's chin in his hand. "Do you remember what I told you, the first evening you served as my assistant, after you divined that I was a double agent?" 

Oh, she remembered. _You have an eye for intrigue--- though apparently not the discretion for it... a few months in the hallowed halls of the Serpents' Den would have honed the former and eliminated the latter._

Her thoughts must have shown on her face, for Snape smiled softly. "Blaise Zabini," he said quietly, "has had five years in the Serpents' Den. Learn from her." 

_Learn from her._ The enormity of his machinations struck her then--- she wondered if he'd ever done anything in his adult life that served only one purpose! For a moment she blinked, awed--- then realized, _This is what he wants me to learn. _

_The eighth square._

__For a moment, they sat in silence, then Snape spoke, in a completely different, lighter, tone. "And on that note," he said, getting to his feet, "there's someone else I'd like you to meet--- who's dying to meet you." He held out a hand to her. 

Hermione took it, mystified. "Where are we going?" 

"To my private quarters---" Hastily, he added, "I mean nothing by it; it's simply more convenient to bring you to Esmé than Esmé to you." 

_Esmé?_ she wondered, but did not ask. 

Snape drew her over to the far wall, pulled out his wand and tapped a complicated sequence on the bricks; a portion of the wall slid back to reveal a long dark passageway. "One of the many side benefits to being Head of Slytherin," he said with a slight smile. "_Lumos_." The tip of his wand flared with light, and he led her into the tunnel. 

The wall slid closed after them, leaving Hermione _very _glad of the light from his wand and fingering her own with an eye to casting a light spell herself. She controlled herself with an effort, though she did perhaps hold onto his hand with a bit more force than was strictly necessary. 

After a rather long and winding walk, they came to another dead end; once again, Snape tapped a sequence on the bricks, and the wall slid open. 

Snape extinguished his wand's light with a word; before Hermione could protest, he murmured another spell, and a series of soft lights, like the ones near his chess set downstairs, burst into life. 

He led her out into his room. "Welcome to my humble abode." 

She felt her lips twitch at the sarcasm in his voice--- then her curiosity got the better of her nerves and she stepped forward to have a look around. 

It was a perfectly serviceable bedroom--- but, like his office, about as personal as a hotel, except for the wall-to-wall bookshelves covering most of all four walls. Other than that, while the room held all the necessary furniture--- bed, wardrobe, nightstand--- the only things in the room that suggested a permanent occupant were the old, battered armchair and matching ottoman, with an attendant small and overflowing bookcase serving as an end table by the cold fireplace and the large round wicker basket sitting atop what looked like a hotplate on the hearth. 

Snape went over to the wicker basket, tapped on it. "Esmé," he said. "I've brought a visitor." 

The basket made a rustling noise, and then a large blunt-nosed green head poked itself over the lip. "Eh? Who isssss it?" 

Hermione smothered a squeak. The creature looked like a snake--- but she'd never heard of a snake having feathers. And the last time she'd checked, _she_ wasn't a Parselmouth, but she'd understood every word the creature had said. 

"This is Hermione Granger," Snape said, beckoning Hermione over to the basket. "Hermione, this is Esmé, my familiar." 

Hermione knelt down beside the basket. "Er... pleased to meet you." 

It was rather hard to tell with a creature whose face was covered in feathers, but she thought Esmé looked equally pleased. "Ssssso.... thisssss issss the sssstudent I've heard ssssso much about." Hermione looked up at Snape, apprehensively. 

He rested a hand on her shoulder, dropped to one knee beside them. "Esmé's trustworthy--- though if I've broken a confidence---" 

"No," Hermione said hastily. "After all, I told Crookshanks the whole thing myself." And perhaps-- -the thought surprised her, but it _felt_ right--- Severus had been as much in need of a confidante as she had been. 

Snape smiled. "Thank you." He turned back to the creature in the basket. "Esmé is a quetxal." 

"A quetxal?" She'd never heard of those. "They're not in _Fantastic Beasts---_" 

"That's because no one can figure out if they should be considered beasts or beings," Snape said, then added dryly, "even after almost a decade and a half with this one, I'm not sure myself." 

Esmé hissed. "Jusssssst becausssssse we were created and not evolved---" 

"The quetxals are another of Great-Aunt Esmeralda's brainwaves," Snape explained sotto voce. 

"Well, I think you're quite impressive," said Hermione, wishing to smooth the quetxal's rumpled feathers--- literally; the creature has fluffed up with ire. 

"You can fluff up to make a statement, I see ,but not to keep warm," Snape commented dryly, reaching out to stroke the quetxal's head. "She's warm-blooded," he explained to Hermione, "but likes to pretend otherwise." 

"It isssss cold down here," the quetxal whined, turning her head to Hermione in supplication. "Sssssseverusssss never turns on the fire---" 

"Because I don't like having uninvited guests," Snape retorted, and Hermione, thinking of some of the people Snape knew, decided it was a wise precaution. It also made sense of his otherwise bizarre habit of keeping the fire off in his cold dungeon office. "And besides, you have the salamander for company. 

"Sssssalamanderssss are sssstupid," Esmé whined. 

"But warm." 

Hermione watched the byplay in fascination, couldn't help interjecting. "Why don't you bring her up to the teacher's lounge during the day or something? It's warmer up there." 

To her vast surprise, Esmé squeaked and ducked down into her basket, then peered up so that only two large green eyes were visible over the lip. "She's shy of people," Snape explained, then added wryly, "despite all evidence to the contrary." 

"They make fun of featherssssss," Esmé said, poking her nose up over the lip of the basket. "And I can't ssssssslither properly." She gave Hermione a pathetic looks. "Featherssssss are no good for tractsssssssion." 

"Oh!" Hermione reached out to the quetxal. "Poor thing." 

Esmé looked up at Severus. "Thissss issss a _nisssssse_ human," she said, as if daring him to contradict her, then turned back to Hermione, flicked her tongue at the outstretched fingers--- then ducked her head under Hermione's hand, for all the world like a cat wanting to be petted. 

Hermione stroked the feathery head, surprised at the softness. "Well, I don't think your feathers are silly at all--- they're quite lovely." She was conscious of Snape watching her, a small half-smile playing about his face. 

"She's really quite bright," he said quietly. "Human intelligence--- in fact, more of it than some humans I can name." She grinned, remembering his remark about Crabbe and Goyle. 

Hermione smiled back. "I can see that." 

Esmé, meanwhile, bumped her head up along Hermione's arm--- then, to the latter's surprise, began wrapping herself around the appendage in question, sliding up Hermione's arm to her shoulder, and looping herself down around her body. 

"A feather boa!" Hermione laughed--- then, abruptly, caught her breath as the quetxal's great weight began to make itself apparent. 

"Esmé!" Snape's voice was stern. "You should ask first." 

"Hermione doesssssn't mind--- do you---" Esmé eeled her head around so that she and Hermione were nose-to-nose. 

There was nothing for it--- certainly not with Esmé wrapped around her in a friendly death grip--- but to say no. Satisfied, the quetxal craned her neck at Severus. "Read to me?" 

Snape actually blushed as it was Hermione's turn to raise an eyebrow. "Her eyesight's not adapted to reading," he explained, "but she's quite curious. So I... read to her." 

The image of Severus Snape, with two meters of quetxal curled up in his lap like a feathery throw pillow, reading aloud to her as if she were a child, was rather amusing, but Hermione got control of her twitching lips. "I read aloud to Crookshanks sometimes," she said. "Though I rather doubt he understands as much as Esmé." 

Both the quetxal and her person looked pleased. "And now," Snape said, "I think that's quite enough for one night---" he held out his arms for the quetxal--- "before, that is, you crush Miss Granger's spine in an excess of affection." He looked back at Hermione. "She's done it to me a few times, or near enough," he added dryly. 

Esmé, with much hissy protesting, eventually slithered her way onto Snape's arm and allowed herself to be dumped into the basket. "You seem to slither well enough on people," Hermione commented, watching the quetxal move. "Is it just the stone floors that are the problem?" 

"Mosssstly," Esmé answered. "I can ssssslither on anything that I can grip--- but flat ssssurfassssessss are no good." 

"She's got a serpent's musculature," Snape elaborated, tucking a stray coil into the basket as Esmé settled herself, "but those feathers aren't exactly much for gripping." 

"No, I can see not," Hermione said absently, a thought starting to form in her mind. She'd have to write home to her parents, and it would take a little explaining--- even if they still had all her old toys... but if she could make it work--- 

"And now," Snape said, getting to his feet and holding out his hand to her, "as I recall, we have work to do--- there's a little matter of the lycanthropy cure to finish?" 

"Oh!" Hermione took his hand, let him draw her to her feet. She'd almost forgotten about that. 

"And, since we have several hours before curfew--- assuming that you can't get around that little matter--- I suggest we adjourn to the lab and set to work." His tone was crisp, almost brusque--- quintessential Snape, really, from _before_ the night at Malfoy's. 

Then the quetxal peeked over the edge of the basket and gave her a wink, and Hermione couldn't suppress a grin. "Yes, sir," she said calmly, returning Esmé's wink before following Snape to the tunnel.   
  



End file.
